I see you
by Aka Chuurippu
Summary: Andie & Yasutora were friends in Mexico. She recently moved to Japan, she hopes she'll run into him, but is afraid to. When he discovers the changes in her life, does he stick around? rated M for language, violence, substance abuse & sex scene. ChadXOC
1. Army Brat

AN: usual Disclaimer; Bleach and all associated characters belong to Tite Kubo. The only characters that are mine are Andrea Morales-Nakamura and her family.

* * *

I looked up at the Karakura high school, my twin brother was beside me... a breeze blew up my skirt causing me to instinctively try to keep it from exposing any undergarments.

"Ugh I hate these uniforms!" I complained.

"I don't mind them," my twin replied as he checked out an orange haired girl with a large rack walking by.

"Obviously. You want me to start sneaking your magazines onto school property so you can have private time in the boys room?" I teased.

He blushed immediately and stuttered, "I- I D-don't know what you're talking about."

I scoffed at his failed attempt at innocence, "Please, after your play date with a stripper you really think the whole house doesn't know?"

We had moved back to Japan after living in Mexico for several years. Our older brother Diego had passed away, our parents divorced, mom became the primary guardian and knew an old friend she could get work with in Karakura town.

I looked back at the high school, "who knows maybe we'll run into an old friend," I meant to think inward, but had said out loud.

"We will? You mean you will. I still don't know why you never struck him back all those times he tried to beat me up."

"That's because you rotted your brain out on blow," I replied.

It's true, the other reason we were in Karakura was because my twin had gotten in deep with the local drug Cartel in Mexico, they had him hooked on cocaine and heroin. At least Diego's college fund hadn't gone to waste, mom had used it to get Carlos clean.

My brother shuttered at that sentence, "don't remind me." I wasn't listening, I was thinking back to all of those years ago in Mexico when the three of us were children together.

_~Flashback ~_

_The boy that always beat up my brother was back, and he had Carlos cornered, he couldn't see me as I ran towards the back of the ally, pushing against the ground with all of the strength I had, I landed in between them and began the routine. I was blocking his punches, not a single one connected anywhere save the sides of my wrists which was the intention, and even then in such a way it barely hurt at all. I kept blocking him. _

_"Are you going to hit me or what?" he finally screamed. _

_"Do I ever?" was my reply. _

_I never had any intention of hurting him, he was already hurting, I could see the pain and anger in his eyes. _

_"Get out of here, why would a girl fight anyway?" he yelled at me. _

_Calmly I answered his question, "If you had a twin brother and he was in trouble, wouldn't you fight for him?"_

_He went back to throwing punches, I went back to blocking occasionally I'd throw in a "please calm down" he never did calm down. Until he gave me the opening, like he always did. I hooked my leg around his, and pulled, he fell backwards, but I was careful to grab his shirt and hold up his head so he wouldn't receive a head injury. _

_"I know why you punch people. I don't just see the physical you, I see what's inside you, I can see the real you. I know you're hurt and angry, I just wish I knew why. I want to help, but I know you'd never let me. So I go home at night and pray every day that you'll open up to someone, and let someone break through those walls you've created. You're too young to be controlled by fear and anger," I stated plainly, I actually allowed him to see the tears in my brown eyes, thinking maybe if he knew how sincere I was, he'd finally open up, maybe not to me, but to someone who could help him calm down. _

_"I'm not afraid!" he hollered in my direction. _

_"Really? Then why don't you let anyone into your world?" I inquired as Carlos and I left the ally leaving him to contemplate what I'd said._

_Weeks later, I found myself in a situation. The hot air blew around me and into my lungs, causing them to seize up. I was gasping at first, and trying to stay calm. I took out my inhaler from my pocket, but at that moment someone came up from behind me, and snatched the medication from my hand. _

_"Give that back!" I roared and made a grab for it. They kneed me in the stomach._

_"What's the matter Andie? Can't you breathe? If heat gets to you so much why do you live in Mexico? Isn't your daddy some big shot who can live anywhere?"_

_Idiots, why was it always the idiots? He had it wrong about my Dad too. He was military but not active military. He was ex military, currently working as a narcotics cop and my mother was an Assistant District Attorney. I knew that the boy who was doing this to me was the son of a drug cartel member, and since my parents were fighting in a drug war with his parents, it made me a target at school, in the streets, anywhere really. _

_"Why did they name you Andy anyway? Did your parents want a boy?"_

_I was trying hard not to let his words get to me. Don't be frightened, don't give in to anger, don't let him know he's bothering me. "I need that inhaler," was all I said. He kicked the side of my face, and I went down with a thud. _

_The next thing I knew, I heard him groaning. I looked up and this tall, muscular boy was wailing on my attacker. Wasn't he the same bully that picked on Carlos? He picked up the inhaler that my attacker had dropped and looked at me, "This yours?" he asked offering it to me. I nodded, and reclaimed it from him. _

_"Thanks," I choked out, I needed that medicine more than I was letting on and took two doses. The bully was getting back up again and made a grab for the medicine once more. My rescuer punched him in the stomach. _

_"You should stop that, really I'm fine," I pleaded. I knew that if he kept that up he'd have some serious trouble coming after him. He didn't say anything, he just looked at me, and a solitary tear ran down his cheek. Did I upset him that much? I reached a hand out to him, to grasp his shoulder, and he pulled away. _

_"I'm sorry. I don't want anything bad to happen," I said._

_He looked at the boy he had been hitting and then back up at me. _

_"His dad and mine don't get along, n his dad's convinced him to pick on me as a means of trying to get my dad to back down," I said. I wasn't going to reveal anymore than that. He nodded in acknowledgement, and stood up offering me his hand. Such a gentleman, and he was so young still, what had changed him since our last encounter? _

_"Sado and Morales sitting in a tree," other Cartel children began chanting at us. My blood boiled at this, if they wanted to pick on me, fine. I could understand it, but to pick on someone who'd shown me kindness just because they'd been kind? That annoyed me to no end. I raised my fist and charged at them. Cowards that they are they ran off in the opposite direction. _

_"Shut your mouths you punks!" I hollered at them, before turning back to the boy from earlier, "I'm sorry about that."_

_"Do they all hate your dad?"_

_"Yeah. My name's Andrea Morales-Nakamura."_

_"Yasutora Sado."_

_"I know. I've known for a while."_

_"Why didn't you ever hit me? I deserved it," he suddenly asked, his head was down looking at the ground._

_"Because I knew more pain wouldn't make what was already hurting you go away, it would only worsen it. I couldn't do that," I replied truthfully._

_"So you pitied me?"_

_"I didn't say that. I said I didn't want to add to your pain," I clarified and began to walk away. "Where are you going?"_

_"Dance class, why? You like Ballet?" I joked._

_"Seriously?"_

_"Yeah, I seriously study ballet."_

_"I'll walk you, If those guys come back, just run."_

_I laughed and looked him square in the eye, "I never run from a fight. I just don't start them. If you wanna tag along, I won't stop you."_

~ End of flashback ~

_'Snap out of it Andie, he probably wouldn't even remember you,'_ I scolded myself.

Carlos and I parted ways, him going to his home room and me going to mine. Classroom 1-3... wow that seemed weird, I shook my head a bit an took a deep breath to steady myself when I heard it. A girl screaming and running down the hall, there was a brown haired boy chasing her.

"Get away from me Keigo! Don't touch me!" she was screaming. They were coming right at me, so I acted. I let the girl run by, but the second Keigo got close enough my hand flew up in front of me and pressed into his chest.

"Cool your jets," I warned.

He went to give me a hug, and I manuvered out of his reach. What was with this guy?

"Come on! All new chicks get a hug!" the guy exclaimed as he tried to hug me again.

"Not this 'chick'," I replied as I moved again, "By the way, I'm not a girl, a babe, or a chick. I'm a woman, and my first impression is that you're a giant dick!"

He tried again to hug me. 'Oh that is it!' I was annoyed, I felt harassed, and I sure as hell wasn't going to take it. He came running towards me with his arms open to hug me, and my hand tightened into a fist.

"Stay back," I warned him. He didn't listen. Pow! My fist had connected with his cheek bone just under the eye. He fell to the floor whimpering. What a coward, I hadn't even hit him at full force. Sighing I walked over him and into the class room._ 'Great way to start in a new town, never mind a new school,' _I thought to myself bitterly.

A voice caught me off guard, "Andrea?" I was frozen with shock. I could only think of one person in Karakura who would possibly know who I am. I turned and saw his angular tanned face, that same hair style he'd had since childhood, with one eye covered, and the other clear to see what was going on around him.

"Yasutora, imagine that," I replied smiling broadly. I must've looked like a maniac. He was smiling. I'd missed seeing that.

His voice broke into my thoughts, "When did you move here?" he motioned for me to sit on his desk, I readily accepted the offer.

"Over the weekend, I don't know what was worse; the move or jet lag," I joked.

"Need any help?"

"Thank you for the offer, but it's mostly done. Just wish we'd painted before hand," I laughed.

"Your parents get a job offer here or something?"

My smile fell, "Yeah or something. What have you been up to?"

He shrugged, "I'm in a band."

"Still playin' bass?"

He nodded. "Hey Chad, whose your new friend here?" Some boys asked nodding in my direction.. "Andrea Morales-Nakamura, nice to meet you... uhh...?"

"Mizuiro Kojima," a young looking man with dark hair replied.

"Ichigo Kurosaki," the orange hair boy replied, then I spotted him. Keigo.

"You again?" I was visibly tense. "You two have met?" Mizuiro inquired.

"In the hall when he was chasing a girl who was crying, I stopped him then he kept trying to cop a feel from me," I spat out.

Next thing I knew Ichigo's fist connected with Keigo's nose and Mizuiro stomped on Keigo's hand "What the hell is wrong with you Keigo!" the two of them demanded.

"Keigo, I've never once laid a hand on you. I've always accepted that you're you and just held you back. Andie's different though. If you go after her again, it won't be Ichigo's fist you have to worry about," Chad warned, his own fist clenching to emphasis his point. Keigo's eyes went wide and he jumped to his feet, hand out stretched.

"Hi Keigo Asano, I'm a perverted pig with no brain who should learn to be more considerate of women and not view them as objects, and Chad-kun please accept my humblest apologies. I am a worm!"

I wanted to laugh, but choked the urge back and shook the teenager's hand instead.

"well 'perverted brainless pig'... I'm a hard core feminist who hates having to wear skirts to school, I play drums and rhythm guitar, and I've been trained in self defence since I learned to walk. But if you're nice to me, I'll be nice," I said raising to my feet to make my points clear.

"Oh my god! It's a new goddess!" a girl's voice cried out. A redhead with glasses was flying at me with her arms wide open. I reacted instinctively, I grabbed a hold of her shirt, placed one foot on her abdomen and fell backwards, as I hit the ground I released my grip on her, flipping my would be bear hugger over my head. I leapt back up to my feet and looked at her in the awkward position she had landed.

"What the flying frozen hell is with your classmates Yasutora?"

He shrugged in response. I laughed grateful that my father had taught hand-to-hand combat in the military and passed that knowledge on to me as well as weapons combat. I could throw a knife with better accuracy than most police could fire a gun, speaking of I was deadly with a pistol or a semi-automatic. Chad didn't know any of that. Hmm, the everyday advantage of growing up an army brat with a protective father who wanted his daughter to be self-reliant.


	2. Debt

Chapter 2: Debt

The day dragged out slowly. Of course I had to embarrass myself in front of the class by introducing myself and saying a few things about who I am n where I'm from. The most common question regarding Mexico being "Do you know Chad?" I felt close to telling them that Mexico wasn't a square block, but yes I knew Yasutora Sado who was also called Chad.  
After school, I stood outside of Carlos' homeroom waiting for him, only for the teacher to tell me that he had gone home sick. Sick? He'd been fine this morning, but when she started describing the symptoms ... Mi Dios! I raced out of the school not even hearing Chad or Ichigo call out to me. I had to get home fast, if he was sick the way she was describing, he wasn't as recovered as we'd thought which meant he might be secretly using. If that was the case, I was going to bust him up. "Andie!" I vaguely recognized someone calling my name. I kept running, I had to get to Carlos. That's when I felt a hand on my wrist, I spun around to see who it was. Mi Dios, it couldn't be, but it was.

Chad saw the man who seemingly appeared out of the shadows and grab Andrea's arm. His eyes widened in horror as he realised who the man was, the fear in him rose even more as he watched three other men appear behind him and surround Andie.

"Ichigo," Chad's voice was shaky... something Ichigo had never heard before from Chad. Orihime, Rukia, even Uryuu and himself... but never Chad... he wasn't one to fear anything.

"I see it," Ichigo reassured his friend. Chad knew who they were, he recognized one of them as being the 12 year old he had beaten up so many years ago after Andrea and Abuelo had broken through his barriers through their repeated kindness towards him.

_'Damn this skirt... it is short and loose enough to give me the proper movement to beat these idiots up, but I'd also be flashing anyone who comes by here,'_ I thought to myself, and that wasn't even mentioning that there was no room at all anywhere for a lipstick blade which would be useful against these guys, they liked to fight dirty. "Well, it looks like Carlos was telling the truth about that uniform," the first guy sneered, he was speaking in Spanish, so I decided I'd respond accordingly.

"What are you talking about?" I demanded to know.

"I ran into him. Honestly Andie you're smart, did you really think you could hide him from us? Not when there's still a debt owing to us."

I had some saved up from my last job these punks wanted money, fine. There was only one question, "how much?"

"Ten thousand Pasos"

My eyes widened and my heart broke, ten thousand? No way either of us would be able to come up with that from part-time jobs. But, I did have a scholarship pending, and a few grants. I thought about my education savings. "I'll get it Juan," I stated calmly.

"No, no no, see before in Mexico paying off the debt would've been enough but now... now you ran. Now you're going to pay for thinking you're better than us."

He grabbed my arm as someone wrapped their arms around me from behind, I realised with horror what they were planning. Not while I had some fight in me. I knew the person behind me was taller than I was, with one fluid motion I jumped up, and kicked Juan in the stomach, threw my head back and got the sneak attack coward in the mouth. He loosened his grip on me, next was an elbow to the stomach, then the groin, then another to the nose. I grabbed his arm and flipped him into Juan and a third Cartel member. Juan put on his brass knuckles and charged at me. I blocked his punch, and delivered one of my own to his nose, then spun and delivered a high kick to his jaw.

"Shit, she really can fight!" Ichigo exclaimed. Chad stayed quiet, he knew this was just Andrea warming up and that she was a very resourceful fighter but he also knew she usually carried a concealed weapon for protection and in a skirt there was no way to achieve this. Her resourcefulness was demonstrated when the fourth of the members tried to throw a knife at her, she used a trash can lid to catch the knife, then surprised both of them as she pulled the knife out of its embedded prison and threw it back at her attacker, hitting his leather jacket and pinning him to a tree.  
The third Cartel member was back on his feet and made a grab for her, she used her dance training to deliver a barrel turn combined with a jump kick, which landed square on her attacker's larynx. But she butchered the landing, meaning to land on her feet she instead landed on one foot, and the side of the other foot causing her to fall to the ground hard. The fourth Cartel member who had been pinned was now free, and saw his chance. As he approached her though, he felt someone grab the back of his jacket, turning he saw a face he had long ago forgotten. "You?" was all he could get out before Chad punched his mouth, sending him flying into a dumpster and he lost consciousness.

"What are you doing?" I shouted in bewilderment

"Helping."

"Idiot! You just dragged yourself into a very dangerous situation! You fool! Why the hell would you do that?" I was out raged, hadn't he clued into who these guys were and what they could do? Didn't he know that by getting involved and backing me up he was risking his life and the lives of any other friends, or even family in danger? Why the hell did he just do that?

"Why didn't you ever hit me?"

~~ Flashback ~~

"Yasutora, I already told you why I didn't."

"I don't buy it."

"You think I'm lying to you, why?"

"It seems too honest to be true."

I gave my 12 year old friend a look that said he wasn't making sense, my dark auburn hair was blowing in my face as I stared him down. He blushed under my gaze, I felt my face flush knowing why he was blushing. I knew what he was wondering, he was too shy to ask it. "Well... maybe that had a little to do with it," I admitted, knowing what he had wanted to ask. Did I have a crush on him?

"Do you still?"

"Yasutora, we're friends. I like being friends," I replied. It was true, I did still have a crush on him. Who wouldn't? A body like that and the way he cuddled my kitten, Misty, sometimes we'd even jam with Diego. He played drums, Yasutora played bass guitar, and I did rhythm guitar. He had a tough exterior, but he had a kind heart. I always knew he did. I'd been afraid of damaging that kindness which was why I never threw a punch his way. "I see," he replied.

"But all friendships take a natural turn with time, so who knows?"

"Yeah, true." He stated smiling a bit. He shimmied a little closer to me as we watched the sunset from my roof, I could feel the heat coming off his body. He always had that warmth about him, I wondered why it was so intense from him. I snuck a glimpse of him watching his expression, he rarely showed any emotion around anyone. For some reason with me, when it was the two of us, just for that bit of time when it's only the two of us, no brothers, no classmates, no parents or grandparents... he'd let his guard down and he would show that he had more emotion brewing in him than any other person I knew. Yet those big hands, those strong arms, if he saw anyone in trouble these days he was instantly at their side. Even when I knew he was afraid he'd lose, he faced his fears without thinking, I admired him for that. I wished one day I could be that way.

~~ end of Flashback~~

"Yasutora..." I wanted to say something, but I couldn't find the words. I was still attracted to him, the years apart hadn't changed that, but if he knew what had happened...I was too ashamed to tell him. How could I?_ 'Hi it's me Andrea oh my twin's now a recovering addict, my older brother was killed by the Cartel and I just about got raped as a form of humiliation punishment and repayment due to a debt my idiot brother got himself in. So how's your life? Oh by the way, I have the biggest crush on you. Yeah right! That'll go over easy when pigs fly without umbrellas.'_

"Where did you learn to fight like that?" Ichigo asked, genuine curiosity saturated his voice.

"My father was a military combat specialist before he was honourably discharged. Now he's a cop. Being a girl, in Mexico, with a cop father who was trying to bring down the Cartel, he worried about me, and taught me all he knew practically from the day I took my first step," I replied. A realisation dawned on me, "Were you two following me?"

"I was following Chad," Ichigo replied, my attention snapped to my childhood friend. "Well? Why were you following me?"

"I know that look you had on your face. Something had you spooked. I wanted to make sure you were alright."

"I'm a big girl now Yasutora, I can take care of myself," I snapped at him.

"I didn't say you couldn't. I just said I wanted to reassure myself."

"And are you reassured? Cause I don't have time for this, I have to get home," I rambled picking up my book bag, the strap had broken free on one side during my struggle. _'Oh great, just what I need at a time like this,' _I thought as tears began to sting my eyes. I wanted to unload on them both, tell them everything. But I feared what would happen if I did, the fear kept my tongue frozen and pushed my legs to move away from them.

"Andie, are you angry at me?"

"I'm not angry, I'm worried," I replied, and started back into a fast run but quickly slowed down when I realised the pain shooting through my ankle. "Are you alright?" Ichigo asked. _Damn it to hell quit fussing over me!_

"No, I'm a china doll. Yes I'm fine. It's just a slight twist, that's all," I hollered over my shoulder as I kept walking.

"Is she always like this? You know kind of dual personality?"

"No. Last time I saw her even slightly resembling this was back when we became friends. One of the children of a Cartel member was keeping her medication away, and I forced him to give it back. Even though she was starting to go pale, and she was barely able to breathe, she stopped me from using more force than I needed to. Telling me that if I left too many marks and it got traced back to her, I'd be in danger. That was the first time I raised my fist to defend someone."

"How old were you then?"

"Ten."

I got home and just as the teacher had said, Carlos was indeed sick, I found out by the horrific noises coming from the bathroom, looking at the floor mat, I saw that Mom had come home from work early. I grabbed an ice pack from the freezer for my ankle, and went into the bathroom to take over the withdrawl watch.

"Mom, go back to the office, I'll take care of it," I offered, putting my book bag down. Mom looked up at me and her facial expression told me everything, she had been on the phone with Dad, having one of their 'discussions' which Carlos and I referred to as meltdowns she said it was how they 'talked' things out. I remembered when they actually used to talk, these days it was all yelling and screaming trying to see who could be louder than the other, who could maintain more curse words in their vocabulary, and who knew the law better. I sighed heavily, the best part was she kept telling me things were getting better. Was she blind?

"It's okay honey, I told Mamoru about what happened with your brother, and although I just started today he's known me since law school."

"Mom, I've got it. Go back to work," I insisted. She couldn't afford to lose her new job, I knew it, she knew it, and that selfish horses' behind hunched over the toilet knew it.

"Alright, I'll call Mamoru and tell him I'll conference consultations from the home office," she compromised. I nodded and took her place at the side of the bathtub, grabbing a hand towel to use as a barrier between the ice pack and my skin. I kept my eyes locked on Carlos as he launched himself over the toilet bowl and emptied more of his stomach contents, I was amazed he still had something to bring up considering he had supposively gone home around noon.

"You slip?" I asked quietly when I knew mom was out of ear shot.

"I'm sorry," Carlos started. He looked horrible.

"Why are you lying?"

"I'm not! I took one dose... just one line. I didn't think it would make me this sick."

"When?"

"Night before we moved here. I've been sick when I left the house to go and jog. I said I was jogging, I was in near by public washrooms puking, I concealed the withrdrawl with nutmeg, but someone moved it this morning."

"Idiot," I mumbled, looking around in the medicine cabinet. He had to stop vomiting. He was still underweight from the addiction, if he kept this up he'd lose more weight. I found what I was after, Zofran, a powerful anti-vomiting medication. This stuff the doctor said was sometimes given to cancer patients receiving chemo to control nausea, but it could also control the nausea and vomiting part of withdrawl. "Here, take it," I ordered handing him the tablet.

He placed it on his tongue and let it dissolve. "Let me make something very clear right here and now Carlos. You got us all in trouble with the Cartel. They followed you here, they attacked me. And Yasutora knocked one of them out. If you're going to stay clean, fine I'll fight for you. If you're not going to, tell me now so I can shut myself down and block myself from feeling anything. Cause if you don't stop, you're good as dead," I never thought I'd give my own twin brother an ultimatum, but there it was. Get clean, or don't call me 'sister' never mind 'twin'.

Carlos nodded, "I want to stop. I will stop."

"Alright. One more thing, you do any kind of drug, coke, heroin, weed, alcohol, even nicotine or nutmeg ... I'll whip your butt," I warned him, a playful smile danced on my lips but my eyes were stone cold, I meant every word, he knew it. Still he laughed a bit and commented how I sounded like Dad and our late brother. I shrugged and headed to my room. Carlos' panicked voice found me, "Andie you're bleeding!"

I turned and inspected the bathroom, there was some blood. Why did my shirt sleave feel wet? I glanced at my school uniform shirt. The crimson fluid was evident and had ran down my arm, starting at around the elbow area of the inner arm. "It's nothing," I assured him, entering the bathroom just to grab some wound care products and returned on the path to my original destination.

* * *

AN: Mi Dios = My god in Spanish.


	3. Surprise Chad! Surprise Andie!

I removed the shirt of my school uniform and inspected the wound in the mirror, it wasn't all that bad the cut was just below the elbow and was likely from when the one idiot had thrown the knife at me. Frankly I'd had worse injuries in a skateboarding competition, but infection's always a risk. I squirted a bit of sterile water onto the gauze and dabbed at the cut, then I took a dry gauze cloth to pat it dry. Finally, I took a simple drug store bandage and applied it. I always found caring for cuts and injuries easier than baking a meatloaf. I decided I might as well change for the rest of the evening. Pulling off the skirt I found a pair of orange sweatpants and a green sports bra, the combination showed off my toned abdomen and a few cuts that I had received over the years. 'I look like a well used scratch post,' I thought to myself with a bit of a giggle at how absurd that would sound to anyone else, but that's what I thought when I looked at the various scars. Some were from dirty fights I'd gotten dragged into, others were from skateboarding or surfing, and one on the side was from a severe bout of appendicitis. I looked at my reflection again, and grabbing an elastic band, I began putting my hair into a braided pony tail.

Diego would've accused me of being a pumpkin in those colours, I thought with nostalgia. As much as we may have gotten on each other's nerves while he was still around, I did miss my big brother. Carlos could be such a pain in the ass. I went over to my computer desk, and pulled out the homework that we'd been assigned. Just read a few chapters, no big deal. I'm multilingual which made transitioning from Spanish to Japanese easy for me, having grown up around both languages being spoken and written in our house I was fluent in both. I had also dabbled a bit in German and English. I couldn't focus on the chapters, my thoughts kept drifting off to Yasutora and Ichigo. I wondered briefly if I should've told them the truth... who those guys were, why they were after me. What nagged at me more was how disarmed I became around Yasutora, why did he have that effect on me? I groaned out loud and rested my head in my hands. I knew why, I didn't want to admit it. It was the same reason it'd always been. I didn't just crush on Yasutora, I loved him. Shit... what do I do? Do I tell him? Do I tell him everything that's happened? Ugh! I had to clear my head. I got up from my desk and grabbed the orange zip up sweater to go with the sweat pants, pocketed my lipstick pocket knife and went to check on Carlos.

The Zofran had kicked in and he was asleep on the floor of the bathroom. I leaned against the door frame watching him for a moment, and thought about how he had been before. Well toned, a healthy weight, his colour was richer than it was now, and he actually had nice hair... in fact I'd been jealous of his hair. But since the drug habit started, he'd lost some of that muscle tone, due to the cocaine speeding up his metabolism, he'd lost weight, the heroin had caused impairment for his body to absorb nutrients properly. I nearly cried looking at my twin. How didn't I notice before it got this far? Did his moods change? Yeah sure, but show me someone who was never a moody teenager and I'll show you someone who was moody enough as a child to not experience that bit of adolescence. I sighed, and braced myself to lift him from under the arms. "Hmm?"

"Sleepyhead, I'm getting you to bed," I cooed to him. He mumbled something incoherent. I half carried, half dragged him into his bed, took his shirt off, and then threw the duvet over him.

"Andie, I ruined everything" he said, I could tell by the tone of his voice that he was talking in his sleep.

"What do you think you ruined?" I asked, off hand without any real concern.

"Diego's dead because of me. Mom and Dad divorced. I ruined it all," he replied, his eyes still closed, his voice in the same monotone.

I knew he couldn't see me, but I looked at his face anyhow as I said, "You didn't ruin anything. Everything lives and everything dies, that's how the cycle goes. As for Mom and Dad, there was probably something going on we didn't know about before this happened. Don't blame yourself, Carlos."

"Kay, see you after the carnival."

What carnival? I shook my head I wasn't going to bother trying to figure it out. We hadn't been at a carnival since were six. I looked at the clock, six o'clock, alright that was a bit spooky. "Mom, I'm going for a run, I'll be back in a few," I shouted to her.

"Alright, stay safe," she hollered back as I dashed out the front door. Soon as I was outside, the ipod was in my ears and I started a low intensity jog. I didn't have a destination in mind, I was just running. Was I running to something or from something? Most likely from. I wanted to run away from my past. I wanted to run away from what had happened in the past couple of months, I wanted to run from how my world had turned upside down within a matter of hours. I wanted to run from all of it. I found myself wishing I was brave enough to run to someone too, but I knew I wouldn't.  
Three songs into the jog, I felt it... that same spiritual pressure I used to feel all the time in Mexico, as if it had followed me. I stopped, turned off my ipod and looked around, I couldn't see anything. I could sense there was something nearby, normally I could see those things as clear as a nose on someone's face. I didn't know what they were, only that they were hideous creatures with masked faces who terrorized humans and the humans couldn't always see them. I tried to focus but it was difficult. I was pleading silently to anyone or anything that would listen, _'come on, give me a clue. Where are you?' _

That's when I heard a child screaming, I took off in the direction the scream had come from only to come to a crossroad. _Now which way? Come on kid scream again,_ I pleaded. I hated it when children were scared or in trouble of any kind but right now the screams were my only guide. I could normally find these things with ease just by the disruption I sensed... but something was blocking out that sense. All I knew was there was one of those masked monsters nearby. The child screamed again, it was louder this time. The park! I bolted towards it, reaching for my lipstick switchblade, suddenly wishing I had brought the bowing knife instead. _'Too late for that now Andie,'_ I thought to myself, the lipstick blade would have to do. It was smaller, but it was legal which was why I carried that on me. The bowing knife was technically illegal, but it was best for throwing. God please keep that child safe, let them be okay, I was praying as I reached the park. There was a dark haired girl laying on the ground, she wasn't moving, a brown haired girl was sitting next to her, her eyes were becoming red from crying. "Karin... Karin wake up!" the brunette girl pleaded.

~~ Flashback ~~

"Diego! Diego! Get up big brother, get up!" I pleaded. Out of the three of us, Diego was the one who looked stereotypical Mexican. His dark toned skin, his almond coloured eyes and raven hair were all traits he had gotten from Madre. I was the outcast of the group, dark auburn hair, and light brown eyes. At that moment I had remembered that Yasutora, like Carlos, had dark wavy brown hair. "Diego, say something please. Just open your eyes, anything," I was sobbing, not trying to stop the tears as they fell onto my older brother's face. He was gone, and there was nothing I could do.

What had killed him moved once more, I grabbed the bowing knife, and from there I can't really explain what happened because I don't know how it happened. I felt a power surging within me, a power that I knew had been lying dormant for years. It had always given me an insight, an ability to see beyond the surface of a person or situation. A chance to see things for what they are, it was that ability that had lead to this consequence. Diego had believed me when I said that the ones who had gotten Carlos hooked were after more than money and gone with me to face them. One of them had retaliated and killed him. Now they were going to pay.

The knife wouldn't be enough I realised, so I pulled the boomerang from my backpack. I focused on the boomerang in my hand and it began to glow yellow. When I threw the boomerang, it sliced through the monsters that had killed Diego with ease, dispatching all six, and then returning to me, once it did it stopped glowing. I was over taken by fatigue, and collapsed to the floor in a deep sleep. My last thought before slumber took a hold was _'I wish I had been wrong.'_

~~ End of Flashback ~~

"Karin please!" The girl was begging. All I could do was stare on, I knew I could cleanse people of troubles that plagued their minds if they allowed themselves to trust me, I could heal souls. I had once turned one of those monsters back into what looked like a normal person. But the physical body, I couldn't do anything beyond first aid, and I didn't carry a kit with me.  
The raven haired girl began to stir, "Yuzu?" My heart jumped and skipped a beat with happiness, and a smile spread across my face watching the girls. They seemed to be sisters or bestfriends. Either way they were close.  
"Oh thank goodness. What caused you to faint Karin?"  
"I... I don't know."  
"Have you eaten?"  
The brunette girl couldn't see it, but when it moved the raven haired girl's eyes became fixed on it. "Hey kids move!" I shouted to them, the Raven haired girl moved putting herself between the brunette and the monster. _No! Not that kind of move! Diego help me protect them,_ I pleaded within. I can't explain how, but the next thing I knew, I was in front of them, my body was glowing with a yellow aura, instinctively I brought a hand up in front of me, I was thinking to myself _'Stay back creature'_ the funny thing is the second I thought that, the monster froze in place. The longer I kept that thought in my mind, the weaker I began to feel. I didn't know how long I could keep this up. "Get out of here," I ordered the girls. They looked at me, they didn't understand what I was doing. "Go, now. Go back to your parents. Move."  
The raven haired girl nodded, "I'll send my brother here, he can help you with that thing."  
"Your brother?"  
"Yeah, his name's Ichigo."

My heart leapt into my throat, yeah, if it's the same Ichigo that I knew, that's all I needed. With the girls gone, I drew the pocket knife and tried to charge it... only to find I didn't have enough strength to pull it off. _Damn, maybe I can beat this thing up instead,_ I thought to myself. That's when something hit the monster from behind, it turned and went after its other attacker, I felt a lump rise in my throat when I realised who it was. "Yasutora, get out of here!" I hollered. That's when I noticed something different about him, his arms... what was going on with his arms? It was like they were encased in armour, the right arm was covered in black and red armour, while the left arm was white and red. "No Andie, you get out of here," he retorted.  
I couldn't keep up what I was doing, I didn't even know what I was doing, the aura left me, and I fell to my hands and knees. I wanted to fall asleep. But Yasutora... he was in danger. The knife was my only chance, even if I couldn't charge it with the aura, maybe I could just cut something vital to this thing, like an artery or something.

"I told you before, I don't run from fights," I replied as I rose with difficulty to my feet. As I was getting ready to throw the lipstick blade, Yasutora was in front of me, and I heard his voice again but he said something I didn't expect, he thrusted his left arm forward,"La Muerte!"

The monster was gone, and a skull imprint took up residence where it had been seconds before. I couldn't stay on my feet anymore, I felt my legs giving out. I collapsed, but I didn't hit the ground, my eyes were closed, I couldn't open them. I could only assume that Yasutora had caught me.

* * *

AN: Madre = Mother in Spanish.


	4. the truth about Andrea

I opened my eyes slowly, and the sense of disorientation was even stronger when I did. _What the hell, where am I? _I wondered inwardly, I didn't recognize anything and my head was pounding. Subconsciously I brought a hand up to my throbbing temple and looked around slowly. This wasn't my home, and it wasn't a clinic, or a hospital. I was starting to panic, until I saw a black cat next to me.

"Oh, hello there kitty, you're a pretty kitty aren't you?" It's how I always talked to cats, especially my Misty.

"Hello, I'm pleased you think I'm pretty," a deep voice replied... from the cat. I jumped backwards and into the wall. '_Okay, I'm still dreaming... and this is getting a bit creepy.'_

A door slid open, and I looked up to see who it was... I was barely audible when I said his name this time, "Yasutora."

"Andrea, how are you feeling?"

I eyed the cat, and then looked back at him, I gathered what little confidence I had in my knowledge of this world and said, "I think I must've hit my head. I could've sworn that cat just spoke."

"I did speak," replied the cat. I knew my eyes were wide. That defied all logic, how in blazes does a cat talk? It is a cat right? No way a cat could be anything else... right?  
A strange pale man in clogs and a striped hat sporting a cane showed up. I thought his attire was peculiar.

"Yoruichi, don't you think you've tortured the poor girl enough already?" he asked.

"Oh, very well," replied the cat, it began to... to glow? Then it changed shape in to a woman, dark skinned, with purple hair, and the same yellow eyes. "Sorry, I can never resist the chance to do that," she apologized.

My jaw dropped, I did have a concussion, I had to be in a coma dreaming this up. No way this was actually real, I had to pinch myself. Ouch! Okay so it was real... now the question was, how? I had questions I wanted to ask, but I didn't know where to start. These were people with powers... powers not identical to my own, but not dissimilar either. I wonder if they knew about the true identity behind the Cartel that had been after my family and I.

"Are you hungry?" the man in the funny clothes asked. I was going to say no, but my rumbling stomach spoke for me before I could, I felt my face heat up and hoped my dark complexion would hide it. Chad just smiled at me. I sighed, I had wondered if he was angry with me for how I had behaved, I wouldn't have blamed him if he was.

"How's the patient?" Another familiar voice asked. I snapped my head over to the door again to see Ichigo standing there.

"Ichigo, you know these two as well?"

He smirked a bit, "Yeah, I do. By the way, thanks for protecting my sisters. I owe you one."

"You're welcome, though I have to say, I didn't know they were your sisters. I just saw two kids in danger and acted."

"So how long have you been able to see hollows?"

I couldn't help it, my face screwed up in confusion, "What's a hollow?"

Four stunned expressions focused their gaze on me. "You mean..." Chad started to say something but stopped. The strange man seemed to finish what he was going to say, "You've been fighting those monsters that other people can't see without knowing what they are?"

"Yeah, so?"

"Well, what other abilities do you have?" Yoruichi asked.

I shrugged, "I just found out last night I can form a shield, before that I just knew I could... I don't know what you'd call it. I get this aura around me, and I can focus that aura into metal based weapons. First time I used it was with an alloy based boomerang. I'm not sure how it works but it does slice them up pretty good. Oh and I can change the monsters."

"How did you know that the hollows were something to attack, and not just leave alone?" Ichigo asked.

"I figured the screams were a good indicator," I replied.

"More importantly, what do you mean you can change them?"

"I can sense their pain. When I can pinpoint the source of that pain, and help them work past it, they change into ... what I can only describe as a human." The strangely dressed man dropped his cane, and Yoruichi looked like a hooked fish.

"You mean you can sense emotions?" She asked.

"Some, if they're intense enough. It's really more annoying than anything else," I admitted. It was annoying, it's why I struggled so much with so many emotional decisions. Do I feel the way I really feel or is it someone else's emotions that I'm feeling? Sometimes, I know, other times I don't.

"What about reading minds?"

I glared at him, "If I could that would be the first thing I'd learn to control, invading people's minds and feeling their emotions to me is very rude."

"How long have you been like this?"

"If I'm honest, I can first remember being able to feel other people's emotions when I was about seven. I'd cry if someone else was crying, I'd laugh if they laughed. As I grew I learned to control it more and more. Mostly by turning myself numb and trying not to get involved with people, so I was a loner in elementary school. When I got older, I learned how to put up, what I can only describe as a wall to block out emotions that weren't my own, and I learned how to take that wall down at will so I can help those monsters... or hollows."

A fifth person was now standing in the door, I could smell the food from where I was sitting and my growling stomach gave me no way to refuse. I just hoped one thing regarding the food. So when I looked at the food, I was stunned. It was all vegetarian, I looked over at Yasutora in disbelief. "Did you think I'd forget?" He sounded almost insulted. I blushed, I guess he was right, it was unusual to hear of a Mexican vegetarian, but this wasn't by choice, I still ate eggs, dairy products, and meat substitutes (obviously), but my stomach was never able to tolerate meat for some reason we still didn't fully understand. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean it like that, it's just..."

Alright how to tell him that my own brothers would at times neglect that I had to stay vegetarian. "Diego and Carlos sometimes tried to force me to eat meat, they seem to think that it's all psychological or something."

Chad's fist had clenched, "Nothing psychological about what I saw when that kid at the school barbeque got you to eat a hamburger saying it was a veggie burger."

That was true, I had barely managed to make it to the garbage can before vomiting violently that day. Sometimes I forgot to tell people I can't handle meat, so the fact that he remembered after not being around me for three years was astonishing to me.

"Yeah, that would kind of embed it in your mind, I guess." I replied. It was just Chad and I at the moment, the others had gone off to set something up apparently. "Chad?"

"First time you've called me that," he remarked.

"Well, do you mind if I do?"

"Not really, everyone else does. But it's nice to be called my real name as well."

I smiled at that, "Yasutora."

"Anyways, something you wanted to say?"

"I'm sorry for the way I've been behaving. I know it seemed like I was trying to push you away, but I want to explain..."

"You don't have to. We've always looked out for each other, I never questioned that's what you were trying to do. I just wanted to make sure you wouldn't be upset if I tried to reciprocate the action," he stated.

His voice rang through my mind when he asked if I was angry with him for helping with the Cartel members... I couldn't stop the tears. He hadn't been hurt by me, he was trying to make it clear that no matter what, he'd be there every chance he had, just like he'd always been there every chance he had. "Andrea?"

I realised suddenly why he was concerned, in all the years he'd known me, he'd only seen me teary eyed, I'd never cried in front of him before. "Sorry," I hastily wiped away the tears.

"No, tell me what's wrong?"

"Nothing. I just..."

"What?" He had moved in closer to me, I could smell his shampoo now.

"I just... you keep asking why I never hit you before... well truth is, I liked you back then. I don't mean for the exterior and the jerk act that you put on back then, I mean... I liked the 'you' who smiled cuddling or napping with kittens, who cried inside when you heard a younger kid crying... the 'you' who, despite having a soft guy side would defend someone even if it meant your life. I liked you back then, and I love you now," I confessed.

I don't know what to expect, that wall block was in place on my end so I couldn't get a read on his emotions. I felt his hand under my chin, gently tilting my head up. Soon as my eyes met his, he leaned in and placed his lips on mine. I pressed my lips against his, bringing my hand up to the back of his neck. He pulled away after a few seconds. "Andie, you don't know how long I've wanted to kiss you," he breathed pulling me into his arms, hugging me, like we always used to as kids. "I've always had a soft spot for you, and it grew. You were never afraid of me, even at my worst. You're brave, beautiful, intelligent, strong, and I love you."

I rested my head on his chest, listening to his heart beating, his arms still around me, keeping me close.

"Why didn't you let me push you away?" I asked suddenly.

He gave me a look that said 'it should be obvious', but replied with "You could see me in the one point of my life when I didn't want to be seen. Now I've learned enough about you to see you the way you saw me."

Why had I asked that question? I already knew. I guess no matter what you can sense or what you can hear, you want the words to affirm what you're sensing. I wanted him to know that, "I see you Yasutora."

"I see you Andrea," he replied, his large thumb wiping away the last of my tears. Something told me that no matter what kind of facade we'd tried to put on, no matter how badly we wanted to hide, we could always see each other, beyond what other people were able to.

* * *

(**AN:** okay so, don't be shy, please tell me what you think, I'm no where near done with this story yet, but would greatly appreciate some feed back)


	5. Training, exploring & scars

After I had eaten, and recovered some more the strangely clothed man who identified himself as Kisuke Urahara had decided that it would be best if I learned how to develop my abilities more, that was three months far, we were able to determine that I had the ability to form a telekinetic shield when I used more of my spiritual pressure and that it was the same telekinetic energy that I used to charge up metal objects to use as weapons. The yellow aura, was my spiritual pressure, and the unique thing I could do to hollows was revert them back to their plus spirit form, helping them ease the regret that caused them to feel they had stay here, what's more though, the telekinesis along with the empathy I felt towards others is what allowed me to heal and revert them. How exactly we weren't sure. I had also been told of Yasutora's abilities and Orihime's. I had learned that Ichigo was a substitute Shinigami, and that Rukia was herself a Shinigami.

I learned that Urahara and Yoruichi had both once been Captains in a place called the Soul Society, and that Uryuu was a Quincy. It had taken a while to absorb all of it, and truth be told it still made my head spin at times if I focused on it a bit too much. Due to what my abilities were it was usually Uryuu, Yoruichi and Orihime that I trained with, I was training with one of them right now, currently working on how long I can hold my shield. I held my ground, I didn't flinch, I didn't move, I just kept thinking _Nothing's going to hit me_ and so far my shield was holding.

They had offered to do this with me after I had told them the truth about the Cartel that was after Carlos and I, no matter where we went. About how Diego had died in my arms when we went to confront them for getting Carlos hooked on Cocaine and Heroin. I had opened up about how my powers had awakened when the ones who killed Diego had moved in to attack me after killing him. They knew that I had first gained the ability to read people's emotions, even when they were well buried, but it was five months ago, when we first found out about Carlos addiction that things started to flip upside down for me.

~~ Flashback ~~

I stood on the front porch and was heading off to do some investigating when a hand grasped my shoulder from behind, turning I saw Diego. His voice found my ears, "Hey little sister, where are you heading off to?"

I looked him in the eye as I replied, "I'm going to go talk to these people that Carlos' got mixed with."

He was stunned, no doubt about that. "Are you crazy? These are drug dealers. They're dangerous. Let mom and dad deal with it."

I looked away, "I've always been different Diego, but I never told anyone how I'm different... I don't even want to tell you. Suffice it to say I've got a strong inclination that these so called 'dealers' are more than they seem. I don't think they're actual Cartel, I think they're posing as Cartel. They're something else completely."

Diego's eyes reflected his concern, "Different how? And what do you mean posing as Cartel?"

I sighed, and looked back at him, "I'm a freak. I never hit Yasutora Sado because despite the jerk facade he put on, I was able to see below the surface. I could see the real him. He's always had a kind heart Diego, but after his parents died he wasn't going to let anyone else love him because he was afraid he'd lose them. So he tried to hide. No one can hide who they are from me. The kind-hearted and the mean spirited alike, I see them all for what they are regardless of what comes out of their mouth or what their actions tell. No one can hide their thoughts from those who can hear them. No one can hide their emotions from those who feel them. And these so called 'Cartel', I don't get the same vibe from them that I get from humans, even the Cartel children that used to tease me."

"So those nights when you came to my room after my break up..."

"Yeah, I knew."

Diego had been with his girlfriend for a year, and when they broke up suddenly and she revealed she'd been cheating on him, Diego had wondered if anyone actually cared. I had decided to show him that I cared what happened, every time he started thinking about ending things, I'd go to his room with homework and act like I didn't get it and ask him to go over it with me. It was a tactic to start up a conversation, while he got engrossed in going over whatever bit of homework it was I was feigning issues with, I'd ask him about his day, how he was doing. If he was down I'd suggest getting some hot chocolate and watching a bad comedy together. It always put a smile on his face and eased the fear of abandonment that he had.

"Well I wouldn't be a decent big brother if I didn't go with you and stay near in case something starts up," Diego said, he had already grabbed his pistol and placed it in a pocket that was inside his blue jean jacket. "Let's go," he agreed.

Hours later, we had gotten into it with these 'Cartel' who revealed themselves as monsters, Diego was firing off his pistol wildly, and I was fighting them toe to toe as best as I could, then it happened. I heard him screaming out in agony, I turned in time to see him hit the floor, blood oozing from the corner of his mouth, and a gaping hole in his chest. I hollered out in protest of the site before me. Not Diego, not my big brother. "Diego! Diego! Get up big brother, get up!" I pleaded as I reached his side. Then scooping up his head and cradling him in my arms, I tried to evoke a response. "Diego, say something please. Just open your eyes, anything," I was sobbing now, and I wasn't trying to stop the tears as they fell onto my older brother's face. He was gone, there was nothing I could do. It was my fault. If he hadn't gone with me, if I had been stealthier in my exiting of the house, he'd still be alive.

~~ End of Flashback~~

I knew the 'Cartel' that had gotten Carlos hooked wasn't normal, but I never expected what we found out that day, and the discovery had cost Diego his life. Those so called 'Cartel' were hollows in disguise. When I described what they were able to do, Urahara referred to it as using a 'gigai' and explained that a gigai was a fake body. This seemed to disturb everyone else quite a bit, I didn't understand why until Rukia told me that a gigai was a very expensive and sophisticated piece of Shinigami equipment used for a Shinigami who had been weakened in battle who conceal their spiritual pressure until such time as the Shinigami's powers came back to full. But why were hollows suddenly using gigais and how did they get a hold of them?

I was weakening my focus was getting shaky, I was at my limit. "I have to rest," I called out to my training partner. His assault ceased, and I dropped down to my knees exhausted and breathing heavily. "Why do you always push yourself so far?" he asked as he pushed his glasses up on his nose. Uryuu had volunteered to train me this time out in the open because first of all, I was getting sick of being indoors all the time, Second he could control the amount of pressure in his attacks better than Yasutora and Orihime's powers were mainly defensive, not offensive.

"It's a habit. I've never known when to quit," I replied. "Try to tell me I can't do something and I'm more determined to do it," I rose to my feet. "Let's go again," I suggested.

He chuckled a bit, "That's all the training we're going to do today. Besides, I thought you said that you and Chad were hanging out in an hour or something?"

I looked at my watch, he had a point, it was about 45 minutes from when I had told Yasutora that I'd be over. "You're right, I shouldn't be late to hang out with Yasutora."

"Why don't you ever call him Chad?"

I smiled, "To you and the others, he's Chad. To me, he's Yasutora. It's how I knew him back when we met, and it's how I know him now. He's changed a bit, sure, but he'll always be Yasutora."

Uryuu looked at me intensely, "So are you two dating?"

The question caught me off guard, technically we were but we were holding off on telling anyone just yet. "Ask Yasutora," I replied hoisting my bag onto my back and walking off.

I may have gotten to know Yasutora's friends over the past few months, and I was becoming close to a few of them. The ones I was closest to most namely were Ichigo and Orihime, but they were still Yasutora's friends for the most part. I felt if that question was going to be answered, it'd be best if he answered it. The reason why they were letting me train with them, we were preparing to launch an attack full force on the Cartel impersonating Hollows. It still wasn't clear why these particular hollows were doing what they were doing. I mean they devour souls, why sell drugs on top of it? It didn't make any sense, until I remembered something from religious studies.

Some religious leaders believe that the use of drugs, the sacrifices due to drug use caused a person's soul to regret how they lived their life, if that were true than they were intentionally creating situations where people would become hollows after their death. So what? They were rebuilding their numbers? I had joked with Yasutora, "I guess Hanson finally had a correct lyric in one of their songs. 'Did you see the man with the cocaine load? It's on sale for the price of your soul'."  
He had given me a strange look and asked when I started listening to Hanson, I had replied that as a child it was a guilty music pleasure I had, to which he had shook his head.

Finally reaching his apartment I made my way to his apartment door, I was about to knock when it opened, and there was Yasutora. "Andrea, I saw you coming," he greeted me smiling, he was speaking in Spanish, we always did when it ws just us.  
I smiled back and let myself fall into his arms, I had missed the warmth of his touch, the rhythm of his heart, oh heck I'll just come out and say it, I had missed him. Even though we'd just seen each other at school a bit more than two hours ago, we weren't relaxed at school just yet.

He had prepared some tempura, having done up chicken for himself, tofu for me, broccoli and yam for both of us. "Do you ever dislike living alone?" I asked.

"Sometimes it gets a bit lonely," he admitted.

"Mom was saying the other day if you wanted to you could move in with us," I offered off hand.

"Hmm," he replied. I knew that meant he'd think about it but he wasn't too sure. I smiled to myself, of course he wasn't. We were still young and this could all fall apart, but we'd made a pact to each

other years ago. A pact I was about to renew, "Yasutora?"

His eyes met mine, "Andrea?"

"No matter what happens between now and our final breaths, if you ever need help with anything, no matter what time day or night, call on me. I'll be there," I promised him.

He smiled, "Sure. Same goes for you too. Got it?"

I laughed lightly, "yeah, I got it."

After dinner we were sitting about studying a bit, my eyes kept wandering over to him. "What?" he asked.

I shook my head smiling, "Nothing, you're just cute when you're concentrating."

He moved in to kiss me, I didn't resist. After a while I ran my tongue along his lips, he granted my request for access, our tongues danced together. I allowed my hands to wander around his chest, his shoulders, his biceps. Suddenly his hands were on mine and he pulled away, "we've gotta stop," he said.

"You don't like it?" I asked without thinking and immediately wanted to kick myself, what a stupid question!

He laughed, "nothing like that at all. I love it, a little too much."

A quick downward glance by him told me why he was stopping. "Hmm, and if I said I didn't mind?"

His expression changed to one of intrigue, his voice contained a mixture of desire and apprehension as he asked, "Really?"

"Really," I insisted placing my lips on his once more, and letting my hands slip under his shirt. Taking my lead he broke our kiss to remove his shirt. "Couch?" he asked.

"I'm fine on the floor," I replied as I removed my tank top, which left me completely topless due to the build in bra. "Andrea," he gasped looking at me. "You like?"

"Yeah," he grabbed my right breast and squeezed it gently, I sighed under his touch. His hands then travelled down to my stomach and he stopped looking up at me, panic on his face as he noticedthe numerous scars. "Kinda like a well used scratch post huh?" I asked blushing.

"How?"

"Well, let's see," I pointed to each scar as I named what caused it, "skateboarding, surfing, appendicitis and I got stabbed once in a school fight back in Mexico."

His head shot up to look at me, "Who?"

I shrugged, "Some punk kid who thought he could pull a blade and intimidate everyone. When he didn't scare Rosario, he went to stab her, I got in between them. After he stabbed me I still kicked his ass."

Chad looked like he was going to puke, or pass out, or both. He knew that Rosario had been my friend since we were both in diapers, and I wasn't going to let anyone hurt her. I thought he was going to yell at me for risking my life like that. Instead his hand reached my face, cradling one cheek in his hand he looked me in the eye, "don't ever do anything like that again. Promise me."

I nodded, my eyes fixed on his, "I promise you, I won't do anything like that again." I pressed my lips against his once more, my arms around his neck, and eased myself into his lap. I could feel his arousal and the second that I placed myself over it, his kisses hesitated as if he was expecting me to be repulsed by it. _Silly boy,_ I thought. He let out a throaty groan as I began to gyrate my hips against him. His head flung back in pleasure as he moaned my name, making me even wetter. His head was now nestled between my breasts, trying desperately to keep as quiet as he could. "I love it when you're loud,"I whispered in his ear.

I reached down to his belt and hesitated, I wasn't going to if he didn't want me to, looking up at him, I searched for some kind of direction. He grabbed my hand and placed it on his rock hard erection. I took the hint. I unfastened his belt, unbuttoned the jeans, and unzipped him. Heart print boxers... only my Yasutora, I thought.  
He lifted himself up so I could lower his boxers. Wow, everything about him was big, holy god... I didn't even know if it would fit, but it wouldn't be for lack of trying. Yasutora braced himself against the wall in a sitting position, I began rubbing up and down his length at first, getting an idea of a rhythm that he liked. When I was certain I had a good speed, I lowered my mouth onto his massive cock, he tensed at first, causing me to pause and let him get used to the sensation. When he relaxed I started moving my mouth and tongue up and down the shaft, keeping a firm grip on the base of his penis. "Andrea," he moaned, pulling my hair back behind my head, watching my head bob up and down. I had my eyes closed, I wanted to remember the sensation in my mouth. With each movement I made, and each sound Yasutora released I felt myself getting more uncomfortable down below. "Yasutora?"

"Hmm?"

"How far do you want to go?"

He seemed a bit shocked by the question at first. "How far do you want to go?"

I shrugged, "I'm down for whatever."

"Are you sure?"

I gave him a look that said 'would I say I was if I wasn't?'

"Do you have anything cause I don't," he confessed. I thought for a second before looking through my bag. I had seen Carlos either taking something from or putting something in my bag earlier that week, and since nothing had been missing, I figured he put something in. I found it. I silently thanked my brother for his foresight in sneaking a condom into my backpack.  
I handed the condom to Yasutora. "Where'd you get this?" he asked. Ah geez, did he really have to ask that?

"Carlos. I caught him messing around with my bag the other day, since I don't keep anything valuable in my backpack I figured he was putting something in it."

"He knows?"

"I haven't said anything," I replied. The reason we were keeping this secret was because of Yasutora's history with Carlos. Yasutora looked a bit skeptical at first, but he quickly got over it, and decided to open the condom and put it on. I removed my shorts and underwear as he was putting on the condom.

"I haven't done this before," he told me, nervousness in his voice.

"Neither have I."

I positioned myself over him, he held me up above himself for a while. "Andrea, this'll likely hurt... I don't know how much."

"I know. I don't fear pain," I assured him. He still hesitated, "but I'm afraid of hurting you."

I brought my hand up to his face, cradling his cheek in my hand and looked in his eyes. "I know you are, but don't be. I can take it. I want to. No matter what happens in life, I know I won't regret this if it's with you."

He nodded, bringing his hand up to meet mine at his face. "I love you Andrea."

"I love you, Yasutora."

He placed both hands on my hips. "Ready?"

I nodded, and he lowered me down onto his erection. Our breath caught in our throats, his from pleasure, mine from pain. The pleasure left his face and as replaced with concern, "Are you okay?"

"Yeah, just give me a minute I'll be fine," I assured him. He was fully inside me, and though it did hurt I knew the pain would pass. He rubbed my back and kissed me, I returned the kiss, and once it was over I began moving up and down on him. His hands guided my hips, over and over, each stroke more pleasuring than the last. "Andrea, I'm gonna cum," he grunted.

"Cum for me, Yasutora," I encouraged. With that his face contorted, his toes curled, his body tensed. Within minutes it was over, and he relaxed again. I moved off of him, and he removed the condom, grabbing a kleenex to wrap it in for now. For a while we just sat there, holding each other with my head on his shoulder. Then he lifted my face up to see his face eye to eye before bringing me towards him for another kiss. "You're were right Andie, no matter what happens now, I'm glad my first time was with you, mi amor."

"Mi vida," I answered kissing his cheek and then tightening my hold on him as I rested my head against his.

* * *

AN: Mi Amor = My love  
Mi Vida = My life


	6. The kidnapping

After that night we decided it would be best to tell the others about us, as well as Madre and Carlos. Madre was happy about it, Carlos was indifferent which was better than we'd hoped. Our friends had suspected for a while. However it was evident some of them (most namely Urahara and Yoruichi) worried about how this would affect us in combat.

An energy blast came flying at me, my shield held and protected me. I was now able to hold the shield for three hours, and what's more, I could expand it now to cover three other people. When it came to practicing my attack with spiritual energy charged weapons, it was usually Urahara who trained me, and kept telling me that if I could damage his hat I was doing good. At the rate I was going, I thought he'd need a new hat soon. I felt safer practicing my attack techniques with Uryuu who had me flinging the boomerang and whatever else at waterfalls or rocks. You know, things that can't die.

Since I was able to block Uryuu's attacks effortlessly now we'd upped the ante, I was now facing off against Yasutora for the first time. We had been training for about two hours now. Another energy blast, this time I felt a bit of a pushback from it. "You're tiring Andie," he called to me.

"I can take it," I told him.

"No," he replied, he kept looking at me, he wanted me to lower the shield, but I didn't want to. I wasn't done, I still had more in me and I knew it.

"I'm upping the power," I told him.

He sweat dropped at the idea. "Andrea the last time you used your shield at full force you slept for two days," he stated calmly.

"I can do this," I replied, I felt the yellow aura engulfing me, but Yasutora's facial expression told me that wasn't all that was happening.

"Andie... your eyes."

"What about them?" Wait, I didn't recognize my own voice, what was happening? I sounded almost like an echo.

"Andrea Shina Morales-Nakamura, you've trained enough for today. Lower your shield," Yasutora repeated using my full name. He never did that, normally it was 'Andie' or 'Andrea'... but to talk to me as if he were my father? Something must've had him spooked. I lowered my spiritual pressure and lowered the shield.

"Alright," I replied. He sighed with relief, and began walking towards me.

"What was it about my eyes that scared you?"

"They went from brown to a glowing yellow. Same as the aura from your spiritual pressure," He replied. I wondered briefly if intense spiritual pressure could change your eye colour.

"Have you ever seen that before?"

"A couple of times with Ichigo," Yasutora answered.

"Hmmm, well I'm not a soul reaper, that much we know for sure," I laughed. We decided to head upstairs and see what Urahara had prepaired for us post training.

We were sitting up in Urahara's shop sipping tea when he mentioned it, "any ideas for next week?"

I knew what he was talking about, next week, February 18th was my birthday, I shrugged my shoulders. Truthfully I hadn't really thought about it and what I wanted most could never be given to me by anyone, I wanted Carlos fully recovered without any signs that he'd ever been sick. I almost laughed at the ridiculous idea.

"Andie?"

"Hmm, sorry?"

"You were off in outter space there."

"Yeah, just thinking..."

"About?"

I looked at him, from the way his body language changed he knew what had been on my mind. No matter how many times people said it wasn't my fault, I still felt it partially was. I wasn't paying attention to my brother when he got hooked or I would've known.

"You've got to stop blaming yourself," he told me.

I sighed, with what I was able to do, how could I not blame myself?

"You might be able to feel what others are feeling, or even hear what they're thinking, but you can't control what actions those people take," Orihime offered a bit of wisdom. She looked at me, and smiled, her grey eyes gleaming with happiness.

After I learned more about Orihime Inoue, I no longer wondered about the conflicting emotions in her. She didn't know that I knew it, but when I was unconscious I wasn't able to control my empathic ability. I knew that when she was around her friends and at school, she did alright and she was happy, but when she was at home and alone she became lonely and sad. My heart broke for her, abusive parents and the only one who ever tried to protect her before she met Ichigo and Chad died in a car accident when she was a child. She had relatives who supported her, she never mentioned their names, and I briefly wondered who they were and why they didn't just insist that she move in with them? Unless it was her parents who supported her and they were court ordered to do so.

An intense wave of fear washed over me, and I felt a pain in my knee, I guess as I picked up on that empathic reading my facial expression changed. The next thing I knew Orihime was asking me what was wrong. I closed my eyes and tried to focus, a trash can, anything with a reflective surface so I could know who I was getting this reading from. There was a store window, and when the person picked themselves up off the ground I caught a glimpse of them and snapped back to Urahara's shop with my eyes open.

"Carlos!" was the only word I uttered as I took off out of the shop towards him. My ability to locate through spiritual pressure had also increased with the training, mostly by Urahara and Yoruichi playing 'hide and seek' with me in the training room. I don't know how fast I was running, I just knew that my heart was pounding against my chest forcibly to the point of pain, and my lungs for the first time in years were reacting to weather conditions. _I can't stop, Carlos is in trouble,_ was my only thought. I found him, he was outside the market district, and he was being chased by four of the Cartel impersonating hollows. I growled and charged after them, using the training that Yoruichi had given me, I snuck up on them, and then appeared between them and Carlos, I decided to use my shield to try to hold them back.

"Keep running Carlos, get out of here," I ordered my brother. He was trembling, I was shivering. It was the second week of February and I hadn't grabbed my coat or boots when I left the shop.

"I'm not leaving you," My brother answered, standing next to me, in a defensive stance ready to pounce on the first person to throw a punch at me. I smiled at his courage, he was still not as physically strong as he had been before the addiction. His increased metabolism had ate away at some of the muscle mass he had before the cocaine use.

"Go, I've got this," I assured him smiling in his direction, he caught my eye and knew I'd keep pushing until he listened to me, so he turned and started to run away from the fight.

"Andrea!" Orihime's voice reached my ears, I looked over in the direction of her voice to see her, Yasutora and Kisuke heading in my direction.I stayed focused on maintaining the shield. Yasutora began to change his form for combat while Urahara drew his Zanpakotu, Benihime. "You can't save your brother Morales," one of the hollows stated, he grinned in his gigai. I didn't say anything, I kept focusing in on my spiritual pressure, increasing my power as I did. The yellow aura now fully covered my body and was radiating brighter than it had before. "You want a fight, you take it up with me," I told him.

He smirked and applied brass knuckles to his fist. "I'm going to enjoy taming you, teaching you your place," he laughed.

"I'm not a wild animal, and I already know my place," I replied. "It's you whose out of line."

With that, I dropped the shield and engaged the hollows in their gigais. I didn't know how many I could take on at once, or if I could beat them. But soon as the battle had started, the four hollows exited their gigais which flopped down to the ground like empty sacks. All four sonided up into the air, landing next to a fifth Hollow who was carrying Carlos' limp body in its arms. Was he already dead? No, no I hadn't let down another brother. I was going to save this one.

I drew the daggers from a belt on my waist, charging them with my spiritual pressure and leapt towards Carlos. I threw both daggers piercing two hollows, using the training that Yoruichi had taught me I began fighting them in mid air. An energy blast hit one of the hollows, I knew it was Yasutora's 'El Directo'. We were saving Carlos, but then something hit the back of my head, I couldn't stay in the air, I couldn't focus, I could barely keep my eyes open, and my lungs had been acting up progressively worse since I had found Carlos. "ANDREA!" Carlos' voice bellowed towards me.

I was falling, I couldn't stop it. I couldn't summon the spiritual pressure to sustain my midair combat. I didn't know which way was up and which way was down. I saw only darkness despite my eyes being open, I knew I had a concussion. I was going to land hard on the pavement and there was nothing I could do. I was helpless. I sucked in as deep a breath as I could, I allowed my body to go limp and waited for the impact.

The impact never happened. Someone caught me, even though my eyes were open again, I still couldn't see who had rescued me, but I felt it. I felt the same warmth I'd always felt around one person,

"Yasutora."

"I've got you," he answered, cradling me in his arms.

"Carlos, forget me save Carlos."

"I can't right now. They took him to Hueco Mundo," Yasutora told me.

"Mi vida, I can't see," I disclosed to him.

I felt him adjust me, I was laying on the ground now. Next thing I heard was Orihime's voice, "Ayame, Shun'o, Soten Kisshun, I reject."


	7. Hueco Mundo

My vision returned, and my lungs were clearing, it was Orihime's healing shield that was saving my life. "Stay still a bit longer," she ordered me. I did as she told me to, about ten minutes after she had told me to stay still, the shield disappeared and I felt normal, as if I hadn't been fighting at all. I sat up and thanked her, evoking a bright smile from her.

"You don't have to thank me," she insisted. I insisted that I did.

"Yasutora, you said Carlos was taken to some place called Hueco Mundo?"

"That's right," he replied.

"Where is it?"

"It's another world. I can create a portal to there, it takes some time though," Urahara replied.

"How much time?"

"Last time I created one, it took about a month."

I felt my stomach churning, I thought I was going to throw up. "A month? He could be dead by then! Isn't there any other way?"

"No, at least not for you."

"But someone could go ahead of me?"

"Why bother sending someone ahead? I'll send you all at once, I've been making preparations ever since it became more apparent that this could happen. For some reason that I'm not sure of, the hollows have targeted your family for generations. I did a bit of digging. Soon as I found that out, I began preparing to open the gateway to Hueco Mundo. Come back to the shop," Urahara replied.

I felt bad, "I cut you off earlier didn't I?"

"Well, can't say I blame you. You've lost one brother to the hollows already and now your twin's been kidnapped. I can't say I wouldn't be a bit jumpy," Urahara said shrugging off the insult. I smiled in spite of myself. I didn't know what I'd done to deserve having these people in my life, but now more than ever I was grateful.

Back at Urahara's shop, he finished preparing to form the gateway with Tessai's help. I kept thinking to myself, _'the hollows have been after my family for generations? Why? And why didn't my parents ever say anything? Was Diego always destined to die in a hollow attack? Was his death honestly not my fault for leading him into that situation? Now Carlos has been taken too... why? What is it about us that draws the Hollows to us? Who are we to them?'_

"Don't worry about Carlos," A voice interrupted my thoughts, Ichigo, and he was wearing a black Komono, there was a giant sword on his back, next to him was Rukia, in the same outfit but with a smaller sword tied to her waist.

"We're going with you and I brought someone else from the soul society who wants to help," Rukia stated.

"Same here, I'm going too!" Orihime chirped.

Next thing I knew there was some redhead guy whose hair reminded me of a pineapple, with tribal tattoos on the side of his face, standing before me, in the same outfit as Ichigo and Rukia. "Sixth Squad Lieutenant Renji Abarai of the Gotei 13. Pleased to meet you Chad's squeeze."

Yasutora and I both blushed at the 'squeeze' remark and I could hear my blood boiling in my ears, with a stern voice I informed him, "My name is Andrea."

Rukia's fist connected with the side of Renji's face as she screeched at him, "What the hell kind of greeting is that? 'Chad's squeeze', learn some proper etiquette you dumbass!"

"I was trying to lighten the situation," Renji attempted to plead.

I sweat dropped, this guy was a lieutenant in the soul society? If that's how Lieutenants acted and Rukia wasn't even a seated officer, I was certain I'd prefer to meet more unseated officers than go any higher than Lieutenants and chance meeting Captains. Moreover, if that was his idea of 'lightening the mood' I wouldn't want to see him trying to cheer someone up! He'd probably try to cut their head off.

"Renji doesn't always say or do the right then when he isn't fighting. But there are few people I'd trust more in a fight. His style is similar to Ichigo's," Chad offered some words he thought would comfort me. In a way, it kind of did... except that I'd never seen Ichigo's fighting skills save for a few school fights.

Tessai came over to me with something in his arms, weapons, a whole box full. "Whoa, is that a pistol?" I wondered out loud.

"It's a kido pistol. Someone that we met in the soul society had managed to make a kido shotgun, so when we told them you were more accurate with pistols and semi-automatics, they got to work on making these. I gingerly picked up the pistol and examined it, it looked pretty straight forward.

"How many charges?"

"It takes about half a percent of your spiritual pressure every time you fire off a blast," Tessai replied.

"Sweet, no reload time," I replied, and aiming at a far off rock in the distance, I squeezed the trigger. A blast of blue energy shot from the pistol and hit the side of the landscaping.

"Hmm, kicks like a mule, but its effective."

"WHERE THE HELL DID YOU LEARN TO FIRE A GUN?" Ichigo screamed at me.

I sweat dropped at his tone and the question its self. Sighing I replied, "I told you, my dad's former military and a combat specialist. He taught me self defence and weapons tactics. I'm a surgeon with pistols and semi automatics, deadly accurate with thrown weapons. When it comes to close quarters, watch out. I've been wielding a Katana for 12 years, not to mention you saw me take out four guys."

"Three guys, Chad knocked out the fourth."

"Only because I butchered the landing on that last idiot! Anyways, if we're going to another dimension together we'd best learn to work together, right?"

Ichigo stopped himself from saying what he wanted to say and instead opted to simply agree. I picked up the holder and put it on under my leather jacket. There's no sense in letting the enemy see your weapons, right? I also grabbed a couple of daggers, a Katana, and my boomerang. The daggers and boomerang went into a specially designed belt, and the Katana went into a sheath that I attached to my back. I was going in with no intention of helping any of them regain their humanity.

I looked back up at the orange haired menace, despite the way that we acted towards each other, I didn't just tolerate Ichigo, I liked him. He was a good person, and his devotion to his friends and family was touching.

"Andie?"

I turned to my boyfriend, "Yasutora?"

"When we get there, our abilities might change."

"I know that your power is more like a hollows, mi vida. I'm not afraid."

His facial expression softened, he relaxed a bit.

"Alright listen up, for those of you who have not been to Hueco Mundo before, when you first enter the gateway you have to focus your spiritual pressure to maintain a pathway, otherwise it's a very long fall," Urahara informed us, probably just for my benefit.

He then knelt on one of the wood planks and recited, "My right hand is the stone that bridges worlds. My left hand is the blade that binds reality. The black-haired shepherd is hung from a chair. Stratus clouds come, and I strike down the ibis."

There was a blast over to another plank of wood, and what could only be described as a tear in the world's fabric its self formed. Urahara exclaimed triumphantly, "Hueco Mundo awaits!"

"Let's go," Ichigo stated as he ran towards the rip and then jumped in. We all followed suit. Kisuke wasn't kidding when he said we had to make our own pathway, I could see nothing but darkness. Focus, I've got to focus.

Ironic as it may sound I was relieved to see that Ichigo, Yasutora and Renji were all having problems keeping their spiritual pressure under control as well, occasionally one of them would get their foot stuck, or they'd almost fall. Yasutora literally almost fell into the dark abyss, between myself and Orihime we were able to pull him back up. Finally we made it to the other end, only to discover that we were all in free fall.

"Oh this again!" exclaimed Ichigo.

I glared at him "You knew this would happen?"

"Yeah, kinda."

The power began to stir within me again, what was that about? I began to focus my spiritual pressure, the yellow aura engulfed not only me this time, but everyone else. "Slow fall," I called out, our decent slowed to a safer velocity. I caught Yasutora glancing over at me, from the look on his face, I could tell that my eyes were yellow once more, and at this moment I didn't care. My only focus was getting us all down safely. Another thing that I found odd was that here, for whatever reason, using my power didn't weaken me. Was I like Yasutora? Were my powers similar to that of a hollows? No time to worry about that now, I had to find Carlos.

"Okay, we're here... now what?" Renji wondered.

"I'm thinking he's probably in Las Noches," Ichigo replied.

"Give me a moment of silence and I might be able to tell you," I replied. I could feel six pairs of eyes staring at me as I attempted to focus in on my brother. Eventually I was able to tap into his spiritual pressure, as always it was very faint. He had a small amount of it, just enough that he could see the outline of the hollows, not enough to really interact with them.

"He's underground."

Renji, Yasutora, Ichigo, Uryuu, and Rukia all looked at each other, leaving Orihime and myself to sit wondering what they were concerned about. "There's a lot of hollows underground," Yasutora finally voiced his concern.

"A lot? And they're not just hollows, they're menos grande," Rukia added.

"Menos grande? You mean those giant things that look like they're a cheap knock off from a slipknot concert?"

All six of them sweat dropped at my description. Yasutora broke the silence, "Well, that'd be one way to describe them, I guess."

"How do we get to them?"

"You're kidding? You've barely tapped into your full power and you want to go up against menos grande?"

"I'll go up against anything that has Carlos hostage Ichigo. Think about it, if Carlos were one of your sisters, where would you stop to get him back?"

That got him, his expression softened and he let out a sigh, "You're right. I wouldn't stop. No matter what the odds were."

"Neither will I. I am getting Carlos back, I don't care how many of those clown hollows I have to go up against," I informed them.

"Well, let's get going then," Orihime chirped.

"Orihime... stay close to me, alright? I know Tsubaki can take out normal hollows, but I don't think you've ever faced off against a menos grande," Uryuu suggested. Orihime nodded in response.

"What are we sitting around for? Let's go!" Rukia encouraged with a booming voice that shocked most of us. She charged on a head across the desert, the rest of us followed in hot persuit. I knew that the last time they'd been here, Orihime had been captured by some guy named Aizen. I had discovered a lot of things training at Urahara's shop. Looking back on everything, I smiled a bit. I realized then, telling them the truth about the Cartel was one of the best things I'd ever done. They weren't afraid, they'd gone up against these things before, and so I didn't have to worry about them too much either.

They knew how to work together, how to protect each other. Uryuu was worried about Orihime, I'd be sure to keep an eye out for her as well. All of them in fact, but Orihime especially, I knew her abilities were mainly of the defensive and healing variety, not so much combat. Mine were mainly combat and not so much protection. If we worked together, we could really do some damage. _Hang on butthead, we're coming to get you back home._


	8. A chilling voice

We ran for what seemed like hours before Rukia and Ichigo found what they were looking for, an opening amongst all of the sand. With a quick look back at the rest of us, Ichigo warned that we should all try to aim for landing on a tree branch, if possible it was another long fall. With that, we jumped into the opening. I landed easily on a tree branch, Yasutora landed on my right side, Orihime to my left. Looking around I noticed we had all managed to land on a target.  
"The menos grande reside here," Renji informed me. I nodded, I wondered briefly why they were called menos grande, minus large? That made little sense. I shrugged it off though as the others began to move again, not heading downward, staying to the tree branches we moved across the cavern all of us staying within visual range.

An icy feeling began to wash over me, when I turned around I saw it, a Gillian class menos grande. Instantly Uryuu was beside Orihime, and I had grabbed the kido pistol. We were up high enough that only the head of the menos was visible to us. Uryuu and I both aimed our weapons and fired, a blast of kido energy and an arrow struck the menos, it split in half and disappeared. "Not too bad," I said. I had expected more of a fight from a menos.

"That's because we were able to attack it from above, next time we might not be so lucky," Uryuu replied, as he began moving again.

I placed the kido pistol back in its holster and followed suit. We were moving along nicely, until I landed improperly on a branch, losing my balance I began to fall. I knew my spiritual pressure would attract more menos grande, but if I did nothing, I'd break every bone in my body. The yellow aura surrounded my body once more, and the decent slowed. I landed softly on the ground, the others followed not too far behind me.

"Sorry," I apologized with my face flushing, more out of frustration than embarrassment though I won't try to say that embarrassment didn't play a role.

"As long as you're not hurt, no big deal," Ichigo replied. We continued on foot from there.

"Strange that we've only seen one menos so far," Yasutora commented.

"Yeah, you're right Chad," Rukia agreed, glancing around, I wondered what she expected to see.

Red lights began to appear all around us. "What the hell?" I gasped.

"Andie, shield up now!" Rukia ordered.

I raised my spiritual pressure faster than I thought I could, my only thought was 'nothing will harm any of us', my aura surrounded the group as numerous red blasts of energy hit the shield. I moved to shield Orihime with my own body, while the others prepared for combat. Drawing the boomerang, I charged it with my spiritual pressure, soon enough an opening appeared and we all took advantage of it. There was a massive amount of noise as the others called out their attacks, Uryuu was firing arrows, and I had let the boomerang lose. Between "getsuga tenshou", "hakuren," "El Directo" and "Howl Zabimaru" my head was swimming. No, I had to stay focused, if I became distracted by my emotions, I'd risk harming everyone of my friends.

I started picking up an emotion, like my stomach was on a rollercoaster, I felt nauseous. I noticed then that my left hand was shaking slightly, the same side where I had sensed the pain in my knee earlier that day. It told me all I needed to know. The person I was sensing was Carlos, and he was terrified.

'_Of course he's terrified. He can barely see the outline of these things so as far as he's concerned his situation is similar to Dorothy falling asleep in Kansas but waking up in a Tim Burton version of the Land of Oz,'_ I reminded myself.

These 'Gillian class' menos grande as the others called them weren't so tough, in fact all you had to do was slice or freeze them and they'd disappear.

Orihime's voice broke into my thoughts, "Tsubaki, Koten Zanshun, I reject!"

A bolt of yellow energy flew through a menos' mask causing it to split in half. Five stunned gasps escaped our comrades. "Wow, Orihime, what brought that on?" I asked.

"I saw your face, Andrea. Your brother's nearby, and he needs us to get to him. I can't afford to second guess."

I was stunned at her sudden resolve, and all for a guy she may have seen once or twice at school, but she never spoke to him. I simply nodded and replied, "You're right. I am reading Carlos. He's close."

Then I saw something else, it wasn't a Gillian, but It wasn't a normal hollow either, the spiritual disturbance was too intense. "What is that?" I asked out loud.

"An Adjouchas," Renji replied, his body seemed to tense.

I sweat dropped, if a Lieutenant was tense at this, what hope did we have.

"Bankai," I heard Ichigo's voice call out. A swirl of dust and blue energy encircled him, and when it settled he was wearing what almost looked like a dress coat over his usual Soul Reaper uniform, and his sword was no longer the massive butcher knife in appearance, rather it was a black thin blade, an average sword, like a daito.

"If we've got to move fast, I might as well go all out," Ichigo stated plainly, bringing a hand up to one side of his face. A black and red swirling aura covered his face, and when he removed his hand, a hollow mask was over his face, at first I was a bit shocked, but then I felt it. Even with that mask on, he was still Ichigo, he was still in control. "Kuroi Getsuga," he hollered as he swiped his sword from left to right. A black blast of energy with a red outline burst from his sword the next bit was blurry to me, I just saw multiple black jets of energy being fired in various directions, each one hitting an intended target.

After the numerous Adjouchas had been dispatched, I lead the rest of the group to where I could sense Carlos.. thoughts kept running through my mind, _'why was this happening'_, and most importantly _'what do the hollows want with Carlos?'_

Then something halted me. That presence I was picking up, it had changed since the last time I felt it, but never the less it was him.

"Andie, what is it?" Uryuu inquired. I couldn't speak, I was doubting what I was reading from the essence that I felt. There wasn't any chance that what I felt was true... was there? How could it be, and if it was true... was that why Carlos was targeted?

I thought back to the day that I had started at Karakura high and Juan had approached me asking for money, I was certain that when we had sold the house in Mexico, the money used from that sale was used to clear off Carlos' debt. That's why everything seemed strange since we moved to Karakura. We'd soon find out what was going on, the presence was getting closer... it was strong. Stronger than the Adjouchas that we had just gotten rid of. "There's something coming," I alerted the group. Uryuu drew an arrow, the others took an offensive or defensive stance, depending on their specialities. I stood frozen, unable to move.

That sensation from this new presence, like the air after a mid summer rain... I refused to believe it. That couldn't be the reason.

"You never did know when to quit Andrea," the voice I dreaded to hear found my ears.

My blood ran cold in my veins as I let out an involuntary gasp, I knew my eyes had widened. _No. Dear God in heaven, no. I'm dreaming. This is just a nightmare, I'm going to wake up._

"Then again, I'm not surprised. You never did have any fear. Not even as a toddler. It was a full time job, just making sure you didn't get into trouble," the voice found my ears again.

_I'm afraid now. I'm afraid one of us will have to permanently finish off the other. Please don't be who I think you are, please let me be wrong just this once._

"Only cowards hide in shadows. Show yourself," I ordered.

His laughter replied. My stomach churned. _Shit. Anything but this, please._


	9. A glimpse into Madre's past

The sensation moved away from me, the source of that sensation was moving away from us. "Follow me," the voice called out.

I raised an eyebrow, the presence was different from what I remembered, and I briefly questioned if my senses were clear enough to make an appropriate decision.

Orihime started following the voice. "Orihime, what are you doing?"

"That person knows you, and wants us to follow him."

"It could be a trap," I warned.

"Andrea Shina, I am astounded. Why would I want to harm you?"

"You know why!" I bellowed, it was louder than I had intended for it to be.

"Come now, what's past is past. We can't change it. But we can change what's going to happen," he replied, he was still hiding.

"If you're not planning to harm us, why are you still hidden? Come forward," I retorted.

At that, white shoes came into the light first, followed by his full frame. Most of him looked the same, except there was what I could only describe as an ectoskeletal armour on one arm, the hole in his lower chest terrified me, and I choked back a sob, and closed my eyes tightly, not wanting to believe what I saw before me. This was my fault.

"Diego," I sighed, not daring to open my eyes, I felt the wetness rolling down my left cheek.

"I could never harm my baby siblings," Diego assured me. I felt the lump in my throat becoming worse, I knew what would lessen it, but I couldn't. I felt a strong hand on my shoulder, I looked over at the source, Yasutora. "Andrea?"

"Carlos blames himself for Diego's death... truth is, it was my fault."

Diego laughed himself silly at that statement. "You're joking right? It was my own fault, but it was worth it."

Again, I cocked an eyebrow, had my brother lost his mind along with his life?

"When we were fighting those hollows, I noticed one of them was going to go for a ranged attack on you, I didn't have time to call out. All I could do was throw myself in between. The hollow's attack tore through my heart, I was dead instantly. I became a hollow because I regretted not being able to tell both you and Carlos in the end not to blame yourselves. I was the oldest, I was born first to protect the younger ones who came after me. So stop it with the self doubt and the guilt. I'd do it again if I had to," my big brother informed me.

Nothing about his tone or demenor lead me to believe he was being untruthful.

Then he continued, "I loved both of you the second you were born. Carlos, he was born first... he was always a screamer. You were the second born in the set, Andrea. You were so strong that while they cleaned you, you were turning your head, looking around the room at everyone around you. When I reached out to touch your head, you wrapped your hand around my finger. I was hooked. The only time Carlos would settle after having an upset stomach as a baby, was if I laid next to him, with an arm around him. I swore back then no matter what it took, I'd protect both of you best as I could. I still promise that. Which is why I'll take you to him, but I'll guide you around the traps that have been set."

I couldn't stop myself now, the tears were flowing without barrier. "Diego... why is this happening?"

"Madre didn't tell you huh?"

"Tell me what? Why do the hollows target our family?"

"It's because we're the decedents from a family of hollow hunters."

I sweat dropped, he had to be joking, that just seemed too farfetched to be true. "You mean something like Buffy the Vampire Slayer or Van Hellsing?" I asked, annoyance evident in my voice.

"Something like that. Do you believe me?"

"Oh sure, Hollow hunters... and I suppose on Dad's side we're related to the tooth fairy," I scowled.

Diego sighed, "Tap into my mind, Andrea."

"What?"

"I know you can. Tap into my mind, see for yourself. None of it made sense for me until I became a hollow."

I hesitated, what if this was the trap?

"Guys... if I start to change..."

"I'll save you," Orihime interrupted. The others nodded, and so I approached what remained of Diego. Standing next to him, I placed one hand, open palmed over his forehead, the yellow aura began to glow, and I closed my eyes, taking in everything that his mind was showing me.

_I saw Madre, she was about my age, a yellow aura was surrounding her while she fought against a hollow. Looking over, she gazed briefly at a man that I knew from family pictures was her little brother. After their fight they were approached by Urahara, his mouth was moving but I couldn't hear the words. Not until "The last of your kind. You have to stop fighting and replenish your numbers." _

I came back to the present time. Urahara... he had known all along.

"We're the last ones," I breathed, "we're the last of the hollow hunters, which is why they're targeting us?"

"No Andrea. You are the last of the hollow hunters. The hollows intend to make Carlos their king, knowing that you would never kill your own twin brother, they planned to make me second in command. As far as they know, I am. I retained more humanity than I let on. You're the only one out of the three of us that ever possessed any hollow hunting talent. Madre and Chichi knew you would be in danger, but they didn't think that the Hollows would go after Carlos and myself. That's the real reason Chichi always trained you in martial arts and weapons combat," Diego corrected me.

"So if you're the current ruler of Hueco Mundo, why are you helping us?" Rukia inquired.

Diego looked into her violet eyes, "I already told you. I already sacrificed myself once before for one of my siblings, and I'd do it again."

"But... Tio Iago, wouldn't he have any children?"

"Tio Iago was killed in a motorcycle accident Bandie, remember?"

"Bandie?" Five voices inquired, Yasutora had heard that nickname before.

"A childhood nickname, I was always stealing Diego's shirts when I was little, trying to look cool. So he started calling me Bandit, as we got older he shortened it to Bandie to annoy me," I explained.

I was convinced then, the mind reading, the childhood nickname, and the fact that I could sense his presence so similar to the one that had been with me that fateful night so many months ago. This really was Diego.

"You're not still wearing orange and green together are you?"

"Huh?"

"Cause honestly, you look like a pumpkin when you do," Diego teased me, the same grin on his face. The same warm hearted grin that I remembered.

"Shut up. I'm more of a carrot anyway. Pumpkins are too round," I said using the same response I always used.

"Too skinny at the bottom though. You don't have chicken ankles," Diego retorted. I smiled for the first time since hearing his voice, and getting that sensation that Diego's presence always presented... the feeling of the air against my skin after the mid summer rain.

"We're wasting time here Diego," I plainly stated, crossing my arms infront of my chest. "If we're going to save Carlos, we should get moving."

"Right... Forgive me, this is the only way I can get you all in safely," Diego replied, raising his hand, a green light began to shine from it.

"ASSHOLE!" Ichigo shouted. I reacted quickly raising my spiritual pressure and my shield along with it. Orihime used her Santen Kesshun ability to enhance the defense for us, taking a stance infront of me. I caught a glimpse of a defiant look in her eyes. I felt like such a fool.

* * *

AN: I'm pretty sure 'Chichi' means father in Japanese, if I'm wrong and you know I am, please msg me and correct me, I will correct the error! :-)


	10. The components

"Diego what the hell?" I screeched, I couldn't control the anger bubbling inside of me.

"Andrea, it's a stun blast, it wouldn't have hurt you. Trust me."

"Oh really? A stun blast? Why don't you demonstrate on yourself first then?" I knew my eyes were glowing yellow. The startled look in Diego's eyes said it all, at that instant, he was afraid of me, and he had been lying. Not about Madre and being a hollow hunter, or about the Hollows using my brothers to get to me, but about wanting to help us.

"You may look like Diego, you may have his memories, you may have known his thoughts, but you obviously do not know me like he did. When someone appears to be an enemy, I don't give them a chance to attack, you manipulative jerk. I am going to do something I swore I wouldn't do here today. I'm going to save someone."

I grabbed the katana off my back and charged it with the spiritual energy, then I moved around Orihime's shield and attacked full force at the creature before me. He drew a Zanpakuto and blocked my attack. "Foolish girl, I'm not just any normal menos grande. I am a Vasto Lorde. No Hollow Hunter has ever defeated one of us," his voice had changed, but I knew my brother was still inside, he was one of the personalities and I was going to draw him out.

I pulled back and swung again, despite this Vasto Lorde being the strongest of the menos grande classes, I was still able to attack and deflect his attacks. I didn't know why I was able to, and I had the sense that I wouldn't be able to back home, but here... for whatever reason, I was stronger.

"There's a first time for everything, and I'm full of surprises," I replied. Ichigo began to move towards me, but Yasutora put a hand out infront of him and blocked him.

"Don't fight beside her on this, not while she's capable. If she starts to go down then attack. She has to prove to herself that she isn't too weak to save him," Chad voiced his observation of me. Despite the fact that he rarely said anything, and he was usually a very shy person, he was always able to see things that others may have over looked. He saw something in me he had only seen when I was trying to prevent the hollows from taking Carlos. I had to prove it to myself, as much as his body wanted to rush in at my side, he knew he shouldn't, and he wasn't about to let someone else run to my aid either. I needed to do this alone or with as little help as possible, and he knew it. He guarded that need, Yasutora thank you for knowing me.

The Vasto Lorde tried to attack again, I blocked him, then I then spun in midair. During the spin I had drawn one of the daggers, now it was even easier to block his attacks. The continuous clang of metal against metal rang out, until I saw an opening, I threw the dagger aside and focusing the spiritual energy charge into my hand, I thrusted my first forward, penetrating the ectoskeletal armour, and reaching the core of the Vasto Lorde, with that I began the reversion process.

The stunned expression on his face told me everything, he didn't understand what had just happened.

"Let me clear something up for you. If you thought that my powers were similar to a soul reapers, you're only half right. While I do have immense spiritual pressure and the ability to manipulate it into objects and erect barriers, there's another key component to my power. That component is the power within my own heart. It's the desire to defend, to protect, to heal, and to comfort that comes from the compassion of my heart, it makes up half of my power and sets me apart from Soul Reapers."

The Vasto Lorde's eyes, still using Diego's appearance reflected fear for a moment, and only a moment while I concluded, "I didn't understand it before, not until just now when I pieced it together. The first time that I was able to fully materialize my power was when my older brother was killed before my own eyes, I easily dispatched the six hollows remaining in the room at that time. The next time was in the park, when I saw two children in danger of being devoured I discovered I could form barriers and then just now... when you attempted to use my brother's memories and personality to manipulate me my power began screaming and furiously shifting out of control, I couldn't grasp it if I wanted to. I realised the second that you raised your hand to us that you weren't him. In that split second, my power calmed, and swelled. It grew at a rate I'd never felt before. I will not allow Diego's soul to suffer like this. I will bring him back."

The Vasto Lorde began to resonate with my spiritual energy, I was starting to feel a little tired, but I wasn't going to give up. I knew I was close, I just had to hold on. I closed my eyes, and gritted my teeth, trying with every fibre of my being to call forward Diego's memories. He was deeply hidden, that was no understatement, but he was there. I could feel I was close.

I felt my spiritual energy begin to weaken a bit... what was happening? "Haha, you stupid girl, I told you, no Hollow hunter has ever defeated a Vasto Lorde. You'll kill yourself if you keep up this foolish attempt," he chuckled at me.

Then I felt it. From behind me, Rukia, Uryuu, and Orihime had began to pump out their spiritual pressure. "I don't know if this'll help, Andrea... but try to regain some of your pressure from ours," Rukia suggested. I focused in on the three of them, their power and as I did, I felt mine rising again. Spears of light began to shine through the Vasto Lorde before me seconds before the ectoskeletal armour shattered. I fell to all fours, gasping, wheezing, and coughing. Had it worked? I wasn't sure. I had to look, I had to know.

I chanced a glance at what was before me, it was Diego, the real Diego. He was himself, a spirit... without the chain of fate, or a hole anywhere on him. He was kneeling in front of me, smiling that smile that I had never forgotten.

"You are a stupid door knob. You could've died pulling that stunt little sister," he scolded me playfully.

I smiled at his remark and then laughed, "like you would've done any different big brother."

"How did you know you could find me?"

"Remember what I told you when you saw me on the porch that day? I'm a freak. I can get inside people's heads."

"You're not a freak. Call yourself again and I'll make sure to put gravy on your eggplant everyday for the next ten years."

"Oh sure, kill me for being a critic," I laughed.

Rising to my feet I realised with anguish how hungry I was after that ordeal. It would have to wait, there was no time to stop and eat, especially with no vegetation in Hueco Mundo.

"You reverted me, back to the spirit I was before I became a hollow, but... something's different," Diego stated. He aimed at a rock in the distance, lifting a hand, a green blast of energy erupted from him. My heart sank, I hadn't been able to fully heal his spirit.

"Huh, guess I'd still be useful to you."

"Don't try to 'knock us out' again, or I'll have to kick your ass," I threatened.

"If she doesn't, I will," Yasutora added.

Diego shook his head, "I wouldn't dream of it, follow me. I know where Carlos is."

I questioned briefly if we should trust him or not. He was definitely my brother now but he had retained the powers from the Vasto Lorde, what's more even alive, Diego had a horrible sense of direction. Still, I followed him. We walked in silence for a while before Uryuu asked, "Why did you blame yourself for your brother's death?"

"He hadn't known until that exact day about my abilities to read people. I told him I had a strange feeling about the Cartel that Carlos was involved with, like they weren't human. So he went with me to confront them, if I had kept my mouth shut he would've stayed at home and he'd still be alive," I replied.

Diego laughed at that explanation, before informing me, "No, I would've just followed you and still gotten myself killed. I told you before, enough with the guilt! Both of you. If I can't tell Carlos that today, I'm expecting you to Andrea, got it?"

"Yes. You can really be a pain in the ass at times."

"Back at you, kid."

"I am not a kid!"

"You're a kid to me," He smirked. I stuck my tongue out at him. Uryuu sweat dropped at the sight before him. "We're traveling with two children," he complained.

"Nah, we're traveling with two siblings. Welcome to the world of sibling rivalry, funny thing is if they hated each other they wouldn't tease and fight each other," Ichigo replied.

I stopped in my tracks once more, I felt almost frozen in place, the fear inside was so intense I could barely breathe. "It's Carlos," I said as Diego and I took off a head of the rest of the group. "Hey, wait up!" Orihime called out chasing after us, the rest followed her.

I could see Carlos, he was in some kind of cage at the top of the cliff before me, I wanted to shout to him, but knew that doing so would alert any hollows who weren't aware of us to our presence.

"Get down!" Diego shouted, I responded by throwing myself to the ground. He had used that green energy blast to attack a hollow that had appeared right behind me.

"T-thanks," I stuttered, my eyes went wide at the motion behind him. "Diego," I cried out and blasted off some energy from the kido gun.

"Well this feels familiar," I scoffed. My brother and I stood back to back, hollows encircling us. His dark brown eyes caught my light almond coloured eyes, and he nodded at me winking. We were going to make their afterlife hell.


	11. tears of joy and gratitude

The others joined us shortly after and surrounded the hollows, but one of the Adjouchas stepped forward and threatened, "Harm us, the hunter dies."

A smile spread across my lips, oh really, I die if my friend's attack? I raised my spiritual pressure along with my shield, then looking at the Adjouchas who had spoken simply challenged, "try it."

The others let lose with their abilities, I noticed that Rukia was using spells against these things along with her Zanpakuto, Ichigo and Renji had unleashed their banakis, Yasutora's arms were fully transformed, Uryuu was letting off, I wasn't sure how many arrows at once. Orihime managed to get in close to us, and I lowered the shield briefly so she could get in. "Stay close Orihime," I suggested. Diego and I formed a back to back triangular guard with her, each of us watching for attacks while having each others backs. I felt something then, a stabbing pain in my abdomen. Carlos... what were they doing to him? "Diego, I have to get to our brother," I told him.  
Both Diego and Orihime looked at me, from the look on her face, I could tell she was worried about me. "What is it?" Diego asked.

"A sharp pain, in my abdomen, whenever Carlos falls or gets injured, I feel it as if I'm the one getting hurt. Same intensity, everything... He's cut, and he's bleeding."

Diego and Orihime looked at each other. "I can heal him, no matter how severe the injury," Orihime assured me, the confidence in her voice was soothing to me. I nodded, "what if he's dead?"

"I once healed Kurosaki-kun from death, it took a while but I did it," she smiled that radiant smile that I wondered about. Now more than ever, I was astounded by her. A girl with so much pain, and yet so much power, and such a vibrant smile.

I felt another intense amount of pain in my abdomen which caused me to double over with an involuntary scream. Diego placed a hand on my shoulders and began to rub a bit. "Relax, it'll be alright," he assured me. I wasn't so sure.

Soon the battle around us was over, but I was in so much pain I could barely move. Yasutora picked me up and carried me bridal style the rest of the way, my head was resting against the black shirt. We climbed up the cliff, I felt his condition worsening the closer we got. Then it was Diego's turn to freeze. "Guys, let me go ahead of you, there's something there," he informed us.

"Something? What do you mean 'something'?" I demanded to know. He just gave me a look that said 'chill out kiddo, I'll handle it'. With that, he was off ahead of the rest of the group. "Chad, if things get dicey can you guard Andrea?" Ichigo asked.

"I could, but I wouldn't be able to fight," Yasutora replied.

"Then if you need to fight, give her over to me, I'll protect her," Orihime suggested. The rest of them nodded.

"If that happens Orihime, you guard the front, I'll watch your backs," Yasutora replied. Orihime smiled and nodded in response, her grey eyes danced. I wondered to myself if she had ever been this involved in a battle before.

"HÍBRIDO!" Diego's voice boomed. I stiffened in Yasutora's arms, I had never in my life heard Diego swear. My shock slowly turned to amusement, especially with the reaction from our group.

"híb - what?" four voices inquired. Yasutora, and I looked at each other slightly biting our lips to conceal our smiles while swallowing the giggles that threatened to escape us at the idea of Diego swearing, something we had never known him to do. Uryuu adjusted his glasses and cleared his throat.

"Erm... it means 'bastard'," I explained, a slight flush to my face. If Senor de la Rosa were here, he'd have Diego over his knee faster than any of us could've said 'boo'. Senor de la Rosa was always against violence, but he also didn't like potty mouths from younger generations, that was the one thing that would earn you a spanking, unless he knew you were swearing and fighting because you were trying to cope with something. Then he'd calmly explain to you that bad words never made anything better.

Upon finding out the meaning of híbrido, Ichigo took off in the direction of Diego's yelling with Rukia and Renji close on his heels.

"Andrea?"

I was struggling in Yasutora's arms, trying to free myself. "Let me down, por favor."

He complied releasing me from his grasp. The pain was still slightly there but it wasn't as bad as it had been... Whatever happened to Carlos, either the worst of it was over, or he was dying. "Are you okay Andrea?" Orihime asked me. I replied by running off towards my brothers. Turning the corner, I found Diego going toe to toe with some kind of Vasto Lorde, Rukia and Ichigo were backing him up, while Renji stood guard in front of a badly wounded Carlos, Zabimaru at the ready.

I called to my twin, "Carlos!"

His eyes opened at the sound of my voice, I ran over to him only to remember I could only heal souls, not bodies. "Soten Kisshun, I reject!" Orihime had kneeled down next to me, and begun healing the stab wound in Carlos' stomach. "You're going to be alright gemelo," I told my twin.

He looked up at me, "Andie... you came to hell to get me?"

"This isn't hell exactly. It's another diamension called Hueco Mundo. I'll explain everything when we're back home."

"It has to be hell, Diego's here, and it certainly isn't heaven."

"It's a long story Carlos, I promise I will explain everything. Right now, stay quiet, stay still. Let my friend Orihime heal you."

Carlos obeyed, though grudgingly. He looked over at a still battling Diego, Rukia, and Ichigo. I wondered how much he could actually see. He did say that he could see Diego. "Why is Diego fighting for me? I don't deserve it."

"Shut up. You'd do the same for him if you were in his shoes," I threw at him.

"Yeah, but he's not the addict," my twin's eyes welled with tears. He still blamed himself, I guess from his perspective, how could he not? It was his addiction that had started the whole ball rolling. "It wasn't your fault Carlos. Diego was just going to let mom and dad handle everything but I... I always had a sixth sense about people and I had a feeling that the Cartel that had supplied you weren't... normal. I wanted to go and confront them. Diego found out what I was going to do and went with me. He was killed when one of them went to attack me, he threw himself in front of me and took the blow that was meant for me. Diego died because he was a dedicated big brother in life, and even now, in the after life... he's still dedicated to both of us," I explained.

Carlos' eyes were fixed on mine as I finished the message that Diego had wanted me to deliver to him, "So stop feeling so guilty over it. He would've done the same thing if one of us had stopped to tie our shoe without noticing an oncoming car. It was his choice to make." Somehow, actually speaking those words, I felt better, almost as if saying them made them a reality. "Carlos... say it."

My twin looked up at me, uncertainty written on his face. "Say that last bit yourself. Tell yourself that out loud."

"It was his choice to make," Carlos repeated. Some of the strain seemed to lift from his face.

With a final outcry, the hollow that Diego, Ichigo and Rukia had been fighting fell like a ton of bricks. "Stay away from my family," Diego growled.

My heart swelled with pride and admiration. After everything, his feelings towards Carlos and myself had never changed. I suppose that's what they mean when they say that blood is thicker than water... but looking around me at the friends who had risked their lives to help me retrieve and save Carlos, I observed something else, some friendships were deeper than blood its self. Anyone of them could've laughed in my face, or walked away, but when I needed help they stayed, they fought side by side with me, they defended me at times, and gave me strength when I thought I would fail.

I was a lucky young woman to know these people, each and everyone of them. Blood relation, or not, we all had a bond between us. "There, that should do," Orihime beamed as she finished healing Carlos. I looked at where the wound had been, not even a scar. Carlos seemed to be distracted by something. "Carlos?"

"Andrea... I... I don't have the cravings," Carlos gasped.

I looked at Orihime, "can you just heal the physical wounds or..."

"I don't exactly 'heal'. I say 'I reject' to activate an ability because my power lets me limit, reject and negate an event that happened to someone. I healed the physical wound, and then expanded the healing to take care of the addictions he had," she smiled at me, that same perky bubbly smile that always astounded me.

I couldn't help myself, I wrapped my arms around her tightly, "Arigato, Gracias!" I think she was shocked at first, then she returned my hug, I felt tears falling from me once again, but unlike the others, these were good tears. Tears that could only convey the depth of my joy and gratitude.


	12. The Return

Diego came over to us after the master mind behind the kidnapping had been defeated. "Are the two of you alright?" he inquired.

I pulled away from Orihime nodding.

"Andrea, why are you crying?" Diego asked kneeling before me once more.

"Orihime was able to cure Carlos of his cravings. He'll never relapse as long as he doesn't get silly and 'try' that stuff again," I answered, my gaze on Carlos. Diego followed my gaze.

"Hey, one bad experience is enough for me. I'm staying clean!" Carlos vowed.

"Andrea Shina, Carlos Jiro..."

"Diego Haru," I replied, the admiration heavy in my voice. I had always loved my big brothers, both of them. It's true, Carlos and I were twins, but he was an hour older.

"Uhh, guys how are we going to get back?" Orihime asked.

"I can send you," Diego offered.

"Diego, don't you want to go to the soul society?"

Diego hummed at the idea, but then looked me square in the eyes, "sending my siblings and their friends home is more important."

"But if you stay here, you'll just become a hollow again!" I protested.

"Maybe not. Last time we were here, there was a Soul Reaper here who'd been trapped for a while named Ashido. I don't know if he's still alive or not, but if he is then he could perform a Konso and send Diego's spirit to the Soul Society."

"Ashido... I've heard the name. I'll look into it Andie, I promise," Diego swore an oath to me, crossing his chest. While I had chosen to go without a religion, the boys had chosen to go Catholic. I smiled at this action, because I knew if Diego was crossing himself, he meant it.

"Alright. I'm glad this time we can at least say goodbye," I stated.

"Diego... umm... I know you don't blame me but... I'll say it anyway. I'm sorry that I got us all involved in this," Carlos added.

I was ready to kick my brother in the face. Hadn't it been made clear that Diego had chosen his own path?

"C.J, everyone makes mistakes. I'm just thankful that Andrea and I were there to resolve this for you," Diego reassured our brother. Carlos smiled a bit. "So stop apologizing or I'm forcing you into one of my dresses when we get back," I joked.

Carlos sweat dropped at the idea. "You wouldn't."

"I've seen those magazines you're into, you'd love it. Don't try to deny it."

A wide eyed furious Carlos was now standing over me, fully stunned at the same time unsure of whether he should attack me or try to deny my claims. "Usted perra," he muttered. (you bitch)

"Usted gimotea como una perra. Crezca algunas bolas para una vez." (You whine like a bitch. Grow some balls for once.)

"En qué me conseguí?" Yasutora asked us. (What did I get myself into?)

I looked up at Yasutora, "Te amo, mi vida." (I love you, my life)

"Te amo, mi amor," he replied. (I love you, my love)

"QUIT SPEAKING FUCKING SPANISH!" Ichigo screamed. The five of us who understood Spanish laughed at his reaction.

"Time for you guys to go," Diego announced after a bit more of chatter between us.

"You'd better wait for us Diego, or I'll be pissed," I warned him.

"Get outta here scamp," he replied causing the same tear between the two worlds to appear. We all jumped through, and again we had to maintain our spiritual pressure, made even more complicated by the fact that Carlos had no idea what spiritual pressure was. Eventually I resolved to carry him along in a shielded bubble beside me.

"Hey, how come he gets a bubble thingy and I don't?" Ichigo asked, Yasutora shot him a look that said 'if I don't get one what makes you think you would?'

After running again for what seemed like hours we reached the other end. Surprisingly, Diego had managed to send us straight back to Urahara's shop.

"Hey, you were successful I see," Urahara greeted us. His greeting was met by my foot planting into his face.

"You knew the whole time and you didn't tell me? What gives Kisuke?" I demanded.

"He promised he wouldn't say anything," replied a woman's voice. Madre?

I turned to see my mother standing there, in Urahara's shop. "My little girl went into Hueco Mundo and returned victoriously with her brother. I'm so proud of you Andrea."

"Madre, why didn't you say anything? Why didn't you ever tell us? Diego is dead because this was all kept secret. How could you not tell us? How could you not tell me?"

"I made sure you had the skills you needed. I did what I could to protect you from the hollows in Mexico without revealing my true identity. I thought I had done a good enough job. It wasn't until Kisuke came to me and told me what had happened that I clued in."

"What? How is it that I could sense the hollows in Mexico but you couldn't?"

"Hollow hunting is passed down through the same sex parent. You have hollow hunting abilities while your brothers do not because I'm a hollow hunter and your father is not. Carlos has heightened spiritual awareness, but he could never fight them in their true form. It's not that I couldn't sense the hollows in Mexico, I knew who they were. I just took a different approach."

"But why didn't you say anything? Why didn't you come and help me find Carlos?"

"I had no doubt that you'd succeed. You come from a long line of hunters, Andrea. We are the last two on the planet. The hollows began to view us as a threat, a threat that needed to be eliminated. We got too close to the king too many times you see. If you destroy the lineage, and the ability to create new leaders, then the hierarchy within the Hollow world collapses. Without a leader they could never over throw soul reapers, or the soul society. They'd never draw the attraction of defecting soul reapers like Sosuke Aizen. There'd be no order. It would be even more vicious than it currently is and the hollows would destroy themselves. I worried they would make Diego their king, but when they took Carlos I realised what their true plan was. I'm glad you had friends to help you," Madre explained.

"Still, you are right, Andrea. I should've told you a long time ago. For that, I am sorry," Madre apologized.

"Yasutora?"

Chad turned to face me, his eyes met mine, he knew what I wanted to ask and nodded in response.

"What?"

"I'm going to stay with Yasutora for a while, Madre. Unlike you, he doesn't hide from me," I replied. I was too angry to forgive her right then and there. Maybe in time I could, but for now all she had shown me was that blood could be as thin as water, and friendships can go deeper than blood to the very soul.

Madre nodded. Carlos looked down at the ground, wishing he had somewhere he could go aside from home. "Carlos, you could stay with me for a bit if you want," Uryuu offered, pushing his glasses up on his nose. Carlos nodded, and thanked Uryuu for the offer. Madre looked as though she had just been told we were both fatally wounded.

"Why..."

"Because your inaction lead to a lot of issues for our family Madre. Chichi wanted you to tell us didn't he?"

"I.. He... yes. Yes he did."

"You realise Carlos blamed himself for the divorce? You've done a lot to this family Madre, and none of it good. I hope that when I have a daughter someday, I will tell her the truth in terms she can best understand for her age group. I'll see you around Teresa."

"Andrea, por favor..."

"No me pida. Usted no tiene la derecha de pedirme ninguna cosa," I spat at her, venom in my voice as I spoke. (Do not beg. You do not have the right to beg me for anything).

Madre nodded, and turning her back to us she walked out of the training area. I bit my trembling lip, trying to keep control of myself. I felt Carlos' hand on my shoulder, gripping me lightly. He whispered into my ear, "Es aceptable gritar hermana. Usted ha llevado una carga pesada durante demasiado tiempo ya. Dejáis le hacia fuera." (It is okay to cry sister. You have carried a heavy burden for too long already. Let it out.)

I buried my head into his shirt, I didn't want anyone to see the tears falling, I didn't sob. I just let the silent tears fall. I vowed then and there, no matter how many daughters I had, they would all know about Hollow Hunters and our abilities. I felt Yasutora's hand rubbing my arm in an effort to comfort me. I intertwined my fingers with his, again wondering to myself, how did I end up having friends like these guys?


	13. Fourteen years later

~ Fourteen years later ~

30-year-old Andrea Sado sat on the pool deck, watching from the patio furniture as her four-year-old identical twin daughters Midori and Takara swam around, playing with each other. She felt the being within stretch and roll over, she gently patted her expanding mid section and smiled to herself. The twins had been planned, but this pregnancy had been a surprise.

After high school, Andrea had become a University Professor of Linguistics while Yasutora became part of a successful rock band. She didn't need to work, but she enjoyed her career and refused to give it up it wasn't that Yasutora had asked her to, but that she was constantly asked by her co-workers why she worked when her husband made millions every year. Her answer was always the same, "a career is part of my identity, why shouldn't I have one?"

Orihime had her career as an elementary school teacher, while Ishida supported them primarily as a physician, they had a son and a daughter. Ichigo had become an author and made a fortune selling the stories of their adventures with a few tweaks to the characters names, he had met his wife Nori in University and they were currently expecting their first child the coming October.

When it came to Andrea having a career, Yasutora didn't mind in the least, in fact she was certain he preferred it. He liked knowing that if anything happened to him, Andrea would be able to make ends meet for their family. She was fiercely independent but at the same time didn't mind surrendering herself to him and her feminine side once in a while. Just another thing he loved about her.

They had married shortly after she graduated University, and after his band had gone double platinum for the first time. The pregnancy with Midori and Takara had been planned, the news of twins had been a surprise. Twin girls even more so, the pregnancy went smoothly up until the eighth month. The twins were delivered by induction after doctors discovered that Takara's half of the placenta had begun to rot inside Andrea's womb, lessening the nutrients that the baby was receiving and putting her life in danger. Luckily, both had been delivered without further drama. Mommy and babies had been released from the hospital within two weeks. The doctors had however, advised her not to have another baby, as the internal damage from the rotting side of the placenta could not be determined.

Andrea felt another movement from her unborn son, she rubbed her abdomen gently, trying to calm the child within. She was three months from delivery and they had a name picked out from the moment they discovered their third child was a boy, Haru Oscar Sado. Haru had been Diego's middle name, and Oscar had been the name of Yasutora's Abuelo. It just seemed to fit. The girls full names were Midori Andrea Sado, and Takara Carla Sado. Due to still living in Japan Andrea and Yasutora had decided to use Japanese first names. Often Andrea was questioned by her students on their graduation day, "how did you get a name like Andrea?"

That always led to Andrea telling the story of growing up in Mexico and moving to Japan when she was sixteen, but being a biracial child with a Mexican mother and a Japanese father, and being raised around both languages her entire life adjusting to the language in Japan had been as easy for her as breathing.

"Midori, Takara, time for lunch, out of the pool," Yasutora called to his children, placing a trey of food down in front of his pregnant wife. "Now, for the girls and myself, beef tacos. For mommy and baby, vegetarian quesadilla," he announced, appropriately placing the two different dishes around the patio table.  
"You spoil us mi vida," Andrea replied, a smile on her face.

"It isn't spoiling mi amor. I take care of you," he replied, planting a quick light kiss on her lips.

"Eww! Daddy's kissing mommy again!" Takara squealed in faked disgust.

"Eww!" Midori replied adding a comment about cooties.

Andrea grinned at Yasutora, "mmm, cooties."

She gave him another quick peck on the lips, evoking a shy smile from him. Andie loved that about him. No matter how long they were together, she could still get him to shyly smile like that.

Another movement from the baby inside made her jump and gasp, "geez, I swear this kid's having a boxing match with my internal organs!"

Yasutora laughed at his wife's remark, placing a hand on her stomach. He quietly spoke to his son, "Haru, settle down in there. Give your Okasan peace to eat her lunch." Amazingly the child settled in and went back to sleep in his mother's womb. Gratitude shining in her eyes, Andrea looked at her husband, "Thank you Otousan."

Andrea and Teresa had never reconnected, and as far as Andie knew, Carlos hadn't reconnected with their mother either. They both felt that they had been over protected and that damaging act had resulted in the death of their ni-sama. That was something neither of them could forgive. Even when Andrea got married, or had the girls, they hadn't contacted Teresa. Carlos hadn't contacted her either when his live-in girlfriend, Minako gave birth to their son, Jiro whom he had named after their father and himself. Andrea had smiled at that. Although their father was still living in Mexico, both kept in touch with him sending frequent pictures of the grandchildren and updates on their families. Carlos had kept to his word and remained clean for the last fourteen years. Never even touching a cigarette or daring to drink more than two glasses of sake.

As they ate, Andrea's gaze fell onto Yasutora. It was now nearly 20 years since they first became friends, 14 years since they had become lovers, six years since they had become husband and wife. No matter how much time passed, Andrea and Yasutora still saw each other for what was there, and loved what they saw. Andrea silently thought to herself, 'I hope that never changes.'

Yasutora's hand finding it's way to hers, and intertwining his fingers with hers told her he knew what she was thinking, and it wouldn't change. No matter what happened they had faced some of the worst together, and some of the best. Through it all, they still loved each other, and would continue to. As long as she could see him, and he could see her.


End file.
